JUJMh 


^  Of  PR|NCf^ 


21  n  5 

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THROUGH    ETERNAL    SPIRIT 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 


JESUS    AND    LIFE 

FOURTH    IMPRESSION 

Crown  8vo.  Cloth  boards 

6S.  net 


THROUGH    ETERN 
SPIRIT 

A    STUDY   OF   HEBREWS, 
JAMES,     AND     1     PETER 


JOSEPH   F.  McFADYEN,   M.A.,   D.D. 

PROFESSOR   OF    NEW   TESTAMENT   LANGUAGE    AND   LITERATURE    IN 

QUEEN'S    THEOLOGICAL    COLLEGE,    KINGSTON,    ONT.,    CANADA, 

AUTHOR    OF    "  JESUS    AND    LIFE  " 


LONDON 

JAMES    CLARKE    &    CO.,    LIMITED 

9  ESSEX  STREET,  STRAND,  W.C.  2 

(LATE  Or  13  AND  14  FLEET  STREET,  E.C,) 


TO 
MY    FATHER 


Printed  in  Great  Biitain 


PREFACE 

The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  a  study  of  which 
occupies  the  major  portion  of  this  volume,  does 
not  very  readily  lend  itself  to  such  a  treatment  as 
the  Humanism  Series  contemplates.  I  have  how- 
ever tried  to  keep  in  view  the  aim  of  the  series 
as  I  understand  it,  viz.  to  show  the  significance 
of  the  books  of  the  Bible  for  our  age,  but  to  do 
this  only  on  the  basis  of  a  study  of  the  prior 
question  :  What  did  they  mean  for  their  authors 
and  their  first  readers  ? 

My  regret  at  the  delay  in  the  appearance  of  this 
volume  is  tempered  by  the  consideration  that  it 
has  enabled  me  to  benefit  by  the  valuable  work 
done  on  "  Hebrews  "  by  Professors  Moffatt  and 
E.  F.  Scott,  to  both  of  whom  I  am  deeply  indebted. 
Other  works  my  debt  to  which  requires  an  acknow- 
ledgment are  included  in  the  books  mentioned  in 
the  Bibliography. 

My  grateful  thanks  are  due  to  my  wife  and  to 
my  brother,  Dr.  John  E.  McFadyen,  for  reading 
the  proof  sheets. 

J.  F.   McFADYEN. 


Kingston,  Ontario. 
December  3,    1924. 


CONTENTS 


THE  EPISTLE  TO  THE   HEBREWS 

CHAPTER 

I.  AN    UNKNOWN    AUTHOR 

II.  TO   UNKNOWN    READERS 

III.  LIVING    ISSUES       .... 

IV.  GOD    SPEAKING    THROUGH    A    SON 
V.  MORE    THAN    A    MINISTERING    SPIRIT 

VI.  THE    MYSTERY   OF    PAIN    AND    DEATH 

VII.  THE    SABBATH    REST    OF     GOD 

VIII.  IN    THE    DAYS    OF    HIS    FLESH 

IX.  AN    ANCIENT    CREED     . 

X.  A    NEW    KIND    OF    PRIEST      . 

XI.  IN    THE    SPIRIT    OF    THE    ETERNAL 

XII.  A    STEADY    GRIP    OF    OUR    CONFESSION 

XIII.  THE    CLOUD    OF    WITNESS-BEARERS 

XIV.  THE    BIRTHRIGHT    OF    SUFFERING 

XV.  THE    EMOLUMENTS    OF    THE    MINISTRY 


PAGE 

9 


28 
36 

43 
52 

70 

89 

100 

ii5 
128 
150 
164 

180 
190 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

THE  EPISTLE  OF  JAMES 

CHAPTER  FACB 

xvi.     a  preacher's  texts 201 

XVII.       THE    TONGUE    AND    OTHER    PERILS         .  .  .  .211 


THE  FIRST  EPISTLE  OF  PETER 

XVIII.       AN    APOSTLE    OF    HOPE 229 

XIX.       THE    CHRISTIAN    REVOLUTION 239 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 255 


THROUGH    ETERNAL   SPIRIT 

THE    EPISTLE    TO    THE    HEBREWS 

CHAPTER   I 
AN    UNKNOWN    AUTHOR 

In  the  King  James'  version  the  title  of  this  book, 
retained  in  the  Revised  Version,  is  "  The  Epistle 
of  Paul  the  Apostle  to  the  Hebrews."  In  this 
title  four  statements  are  made  or  implied  :  (i)  that 
the  book  is  an  epistle  ;  (2)  that  the  author  is  an 
apostle  ;  (3)  in  particular,  the  apostle  Paul  ; 
(4)  that  it  was  addressed  to  "  Hebrews,"  that  is, 
to  Christians  of  Jewish  origin.  All  of  these  state- 
ments have  been  seriously  challenged,  and  at  least 
three  of  them  are  almost  certainly  wrong. 

(1)  We  now  know  from  the  papyri  that  the  New 
Testament  epistles  follow  the  regular  letter  forms 
of  the  time.  The  introduction  regularly  contains 
three  items  :  the  name  of  the  sender  of  the  letter, 
the  name  or  designation  of  the  addressee,  and  a 
greeting.  None  of  the  three  appears  at  the  begin- 
ning of  "  To  the  Hebrews,"  and  it  is  the  absence 
of  the  first  two  that  has  given  rise  to  some  of  the 
unsolved   and   perhaps   insoluble   problems   of  the 

9 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

book.  Not  only  is  the  epistolary  introduction 
absent,  but  we  are  approaching  the  closing  verses 
before  we  find  an  indication  that  we  are  dealing 
with  a  letter. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  features  that  suggest 
that  the  contents  of  the  book,  or  some  of  them, 
were  intended  for  oral  delivery.  It  may  be  that 
such  phrases  as  "  What  more  am  I  to  say  ?  For 
time  will  fail  me  .  .  ."  do  not  certainly  point  to 
the  speaker  rather  than  the  writer.  But  justice  is 
done  to  the  magnificent  opening  verses  only  when 
they  are  read  aloud  ;  and  whatever  the  purpose 
of  the  work  as  a  whole,  the  author  of  the  eleventh 
chapter  was  a  born  orator.  The  question  is  only 
one  of  emphasis.  Paul's  epistles,  though  genuine 
epistles,  were,  and  presumably  were  meant  to  be, 
repeatedly  read  aloud.  Even  if  "  Hebrews  "  was 
intended  to  make  its  impression  through  the  ear 
rather  than  the  eye,  we  can  hardly  imagine  that 
a  sermon  constructed  with  such  care  and  skill  was 
meant  to  fulfil  its  mission  in  a  single  delivery. 
Perhaps  we  might  characterise  the  book  as  a 
preacher's  manifesto  with  a  covering  letter  attached. 

(2)  Whether  we  understand  the  word  "  apostle  " 
in  its  narrower  sense  as  applied  to  one  of  the  twelve, 
or  in  the  broader  signification  in  which  it  included 
others,  such  as  James  the  Lord's  brother  and 
Barnabas,  there  is  no  indication  that  the  author 
was  an  apostle.  He  not  merely  makes  no  claim  to 
apostolic  dignity,  but  seems  to  be  unconscious  of 

10 


An   Unknown  Author 

the  existence  of  the  office.  The  only  person  to 
whom  he  applies  the  title  is  Jesus  (iii.  i).  He 
writes  as  a  teacher,  perhaps  as  a  "  leader,"  to  use 
his  own  word  ;  but  nowhere  does  he  claim 
authority  beyond  that  which  is  the  prerogative  of 
any  spiritual  adviser. 

(3)  Even  if  the  book  were  written  by  an  apostle, 
it  seems  certain  that  that  apostle  was  not  Paul. 
On  the  subject  of  the  authorship  we  have  no 
definite  knowledge,  beyond  what  we  can  get  from 
a  study  of  the  epistle.  We  hear  of  it  first  before 
the  end  of  the  first  century  ;  yet  the  Pauline 
authorship  was  not  generally  accepted  till  the 
fourth  century.  In  Alexandria  from  about  the  end 
of  the  second  century,  possibly  long  before  that, 
there  was  a  tradition  that  Paul  was  the  author  ; 
but  Clement  and  Origen  evidently  felt  that  the 
evidence  was  not  very  convincing,  and  for  genera- 
tions the  tradition  did  not  universally  commend 
itself  even  in  Alexandria.  That  such  a  theory 
should  arise  was  only  natural  :  partly  because  Paul 
was  "  the  letter- writer  "  of  the  early  Christian 
Church,  as  Solomon  was  "  the  wise  man  "  and 
David  "  the  psalmist "  of  the  Jewish  Church  ; 
partly  because  ascription  to  Paul  would  greatly 
strengthen  the  claim  to  a  place  in  the  Canon  of  a 
work  which  all  intelligent  Christians  would  wish 
to  see  in  the  Canon. 

In  favour  of  Pauline  authorship  there  is  very 
little  to  be  said.     The  place  which  this  writer  gives 

11 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

to  Jesus  is  as  lofty  as  that  which  Paul  gives  Him 
in  his  latest  writings.  Some  of  the  phrases  and 
of  the  more  striking  minor  ideas  can  be  paralleled 
in  Paul's  epistles.  Yet  the  parallels  adduced,  such 
as  the  need  of  a  higher  wisdom  for  mature 
Christians  than  for  recent  converts,  and  the  dis- 
tinction between  (metaphorical)  milk  diet  and  solid 
food  (Heb.  v.  12,  14  ;  1  Cor.  ii.  6,  iii.  2)  prove 
community  of  intellectual  atmosphere  rather  than 
dependence  of  one  writer  on  the  other.  Even  a 
parallel  that  seems  more  than  a  coincidence,  such 
as  the  idea  that  kindness  shown  to  a  Christian, 
especially  to  a  Christian  teacher,  is  a  sacrifice  well- 
pleasing  to  God  (Phil.  iv.  18  ;  Heb.  xiii.  16) 
may  be  explained  otherwise  than  by  mutual  con- 
tact. It  may  be  that  the  author  of  "  Hebrews  " 
had  read  some  of  Paul's  epistles,  especially 
"  Romans."  Beyond  that  it  does  not  seem  safe 
to  go. 

Some  arguments  against  the  Pauline  authorship 
have  been  given  undue  weight.  Even  if  we  do 
not  find  the  high-priesthood  of  Jesus  in  Paul's 
epistles,  that  in  itself  would  not  prove  that 
"  Hebrews  "  was  not  from  his  pen.  In  "  Romans  " 
Paul  can  say  :  "  Who  is  there  to  condemn  us  ? 
It  is  Christ  Jesus  who  died,  rather  has  been  raised 
from  the  dead,  who  is  at  God's  right  hand,  who 
indeed  intercedes  for  us.  Who  shall  separate  us 
from  the  love  of  Christ  (or  God)  ?  "  (viii.  23  &) 
a  passage  which  shows  that  some  of  the  leading 

ia 


An   Unknown   Author 

ideas  of  "  Hebrews  "   were   not  remote  from  the 
thought  of  Paul. 

Again,  the  implication  in  ii.  3  that  the  writer 
and  his  readers  had  not  themselves  heard  Jesus, 
but  had  received  the  Gospel  at  second  hand  from 
ear-witnesses  of  the  Lord,  has  usually  been  regarded 
as  strong  evidence  against  Pauline  authorship,  since 
in  "  Galatians  "  (i.  and  ii.)  Paul  so  strenuously 
maintains  his  independence  of  apostolic  teaching. 
But  whatever  Paul  may  mean  in  "  Galatians,"  it 
is  generally  believed  that  he  had  neither  seen  nor 
heard  Jesus,  and  that  he  must  therefore  have  got 
from  others  his  knowledge  of  Jesus  ;  which  is 
exactly  what  this  writer  says  of  himself  and  his 
friends.  Paul's  point  in  "  Galatians  "  seems  to  be 
precisely  the  point  which  some  of  his  interpreters 
are  so  strongly  emphasising  to-day,  that  his  theo- 
logy and  Christology  were  not  derived  from  the 
apostles  but  were  original  ;  or,  as  Paul  would 
have  put  it,  he  got  them  by  divine  inspiration. 
The  Gospel  in  the  sense  of  traditions  of  Jesus  and 
His  teaching  Paul  perhaps  tended  to  undervalue  ; 
but  for  what  knowledge  he  had  of  this  subject  he 
was  obviously  indebted  to  Christians,  apostles  or 
others,  and  in  more  than  one  case  he  frankly 
acknowledges  his  debt  to  tradition  (1  Cor.  xi.  23  ; 
xv.  3). 

Yet  the  proof  that  Paul  was  not  the  author,  a 
proof  derived  from  various  converging  lines  of 
evidence,  is  almost  complete.     The  writer  is  master 

13 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

of  a  Greek  style  which  gives  this  book  a  unique 
place  in  New  Testament  literature.  The  tell-tale 
particles  and  introductory  phrases,  alike  those  used 
and  those  omitted,  suggest  an  author  other  than 
Paul.  As  a  term  for  Christians  "  the  saints  "  is 
used  somewhat  more  sparingly  than  in  Paul's 
writings.  Much  more  noticeable  is  the  difference 
in  the  expressions  used  for  Jesus.  Of  the  phrases 
"  Christ  Jesus  "  and  "  Jesus  Christ  "  so  constantly 
used  by  Paul,  the  latter  is  seldom  found  in 
"  Hebrews,"  the  former  not  at  all,  though  the 
author  repeatedly  speaks  of  "  Christ,"  and  his 
use  of  the  personal  name  "  Jesus  "  is  one  of 
the  marked  characteristics  of  the  book.  Only 
once  or  twice  does  he  apply  the  term  "  Lord  "  to 
Jesus.  Nor  does  he  introduce  Scripture  quotations 
as  Paul  does.  Paul  quotes  the  human  author,  or 
says  "  it  is  written  "  or  "  Scripture  says."  This 
writer  introduces  Old  Testament  quotations  with  the 
formula  :  "  The  Holy  Spirit  says  "  or  "  God  says." 
But  the  careful  reader,  even  of  the  English 
versions,  can  see  that  the  author  was  a  man  of  a 
different  type  from  Paul.  The  book  is  anonymous, 
which  Paul's  writings  were  not.  The  thoughts  of 
Paul's  fiery  spirit  sometimes  outran  the  capacity 
of  his  pen,  or  of  the  pen  of  his  amanuensis,  to 
keep  pace  with  them.  He  left  sentences  un- 
finished, and  sometimes  allowed  his  argument  to 
stray  down  some  attractive  side-path.  The  author 
of  "  Hebrews  "  is  always  master  of  himself ;    his 

H 


An    Unknown   Author 

thoughts  proceed  with  the  stately  march  of  a  well- 
ordered  procession.  The  end  of  his  argument, 
and  every  stage  of  it,  are  in  view  from  the  beginning. 
By  throwing  out  previous  hints  he  prepares  the 
way  for  discussions  before  he  reaches  them.  For 
example,  the  double  reference  to  Jesus  as  high- 
priest  in  ii.  17  and  iii.  1  forms  an  introduction  to 
the  detailed  exposition  of  the  subject  that  begins 
in  iv.  14,  and  this  is  typical  of  his  procedure.  We 
can  imagine  too  that  in  the  heat  of  the  moment 
Paul  wrote  things  he  would  afterwards  have  erased. 
The  calm  deliberation  of  the  writer  "  to  the 
Hebrews  "  left  no  room  for  after-thoughts. 

It  is  easy  to  exaggerate  the  importance  of  the 
fact  that  when  Paul  spoke  of  the  Law  he  was 
thinking  chiefly  of  the  moral  law  (though  he  does 
not  formally  distinguish  between  ritual  and  moral), 
and  that  this  writer  thinks  rather  of  ritual  law. 
If  this  were  the  only  difficulty  it  might  be  explained 
by  the  supposition  that  Paul  was  filling  a  gap  left 
by  his  own  previous  treatment  of  the  Law.  In 
view,  however,  of  all  the  facts,  it  is  much  more 
likely  that  another  writer  was  supplementing  Paul's 
eager,  sometimes  almost  baffled  attempts  to  explain 
the  relation  of  the  Christian  to  the  Law.  To  this 
writer  religion  is  not  a  law  to  be  obeyed,  but  a 
worship  to  lead  men  to  God. 

To  both  writers  the  Law  is  "  weak."  Paul 
regards  it  as  weak  because  of  the  frailty  of  our 
"  flesh,"  because  we  are  so  constituted  that  what 

15 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

the  Law  demands  we  can  never  give.  To  this 
writer  the  Law  is  weak  in  itself.  The  ritual  law 
on  which  he  concentrates  his  attention  belongs  to 
the  world  of  unsubstantial  shadows  ;  it  is  at  best 
a  parable  of  the  realities  to  come  with  Jesus.  He 
does  not  take  Paul's  despairing  view  of  the  fatal 
propensity  of  the  "  flesh  "  to  lead  men  astray. 
He  shares,  however,  with  Paul  the  characteristic 
that  he  does  less  than  justice  to  the  real  value  of 
that  aspect  of  the  Law  which  is  for  him,  for  the 
time  at  least,  the  whole  Law. 

Just  as  Paul  sometimes  ignored  the  abiding 
worth  of  the  moral  Law  as  keeping  before  the 
Jews  lofty  standards  of  life  and  creed,  forgot  the 
deep  and  enthusiastic  emotion  which  the  contem- 
plation of  the  Law  awoke  in  many  a  pious  Jew, 
so  this  writer  neglects  the  social  value  of  a  ritual 
which  taught  men  their  common  needs  ;  nor  does 
he  take  account  of  the  worth  of  the  emotion  which 
the  picturesque  ceremonies  of  the  Day  of  Atone- 
ment must  have  aroused  in  the  minds  of  thoughtful 
worshippers,  as  they  were  annually  reminded  that 
in  spite  of  their  sins  the  covenant  God  was  still 
their  God.  Neither  Paul  nor  the  writer  "  to  the 
Hebrews "  was  a  one-sided  controversialist  ;  but 
with  the  preacher's  instinct  they  placed  the 
emphasis  where  for  their  readers  it  most  needed 
to  be  placed. 

Paul  contrasted   "faith"   and   "works."     This 
writer  also  speaks  of  "  dead  works  "  (vi.  I  ;   ix.  14), 

16 


An   Unknown  Author 

by  which,  however,  he  does  not  mean  moral  achieve- 
ments by  which  we  acquire  merit.  Rather  to  him 
all  conduct  not  inspired  by  Jesus  is  "  dead,"  as 
being  out  of  vital  connection  with  the  God  whom 
he  loves  to  call  the  "  living  God."  "  Faith  "  again 
is  one  of  this  author's  favourite  categories,  but  he 
does  not  mean  by  it  what  Paul  means.  Paul's 
"  faith "  is  a  personal  trust  in  Jesus.  To  the 
author  of  "  Hebrews  "  it  is  the  faculty  by  which 
we  "  sense  "  the  unseen,  feel  certain  of  the  future, 
and  in  general  realise  the  abiding  realities. 

Whether  Paul  was  a  mystic  or  not,  at  least  he 
used  language  that  could  be  construed  in  a 
mystical  sense  ;  witness  his  frequent  references 
to  being  "  in  Christ."  Such  a  phrase  this  writer 
could  not  have  used.  To  him  Jesus  is  the  captain, 
the  pioneer,  the  leader  who  goes  on  before  and 
says  to  us  "  Follow  me,"  as  He  so  often  said  to 
willing  or  hesitating  disciples  in  the  days  of  His 
flesh  (ii.  10  ;  xii.  2  ;  xiii,  13).  Again,  in  Paul 
the  resurrection  of  Jesus  is  central.  This  writer 
mentions  it  only  once  (xiii.  20),  in  a  revised  quota- 
tion from  Isaiah.  For  this,  no  doubt,  there  is  an 
excellent  reason.  The  spirit  that  inspired  Jesus 
all  through  His  ministry,  not  least  in  His  death, 
was  the  spirit  of  the  eternal.  There  was  no  room 
in  this  writer's  thought  for  that  break  between  the 
earthly  life  and  the  session  at  the  right  hand  of 
God,  which  the  resurrection  has  usually  been 
understood  to  imply.     At  the    moment    of  Jesus' 

17  B 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

death  the  veil  was  rent  in  twain.  There  does 
seem  to  be  at  this  point  a  real  difference,  at  least 
in  form,  between  the  thought  of  this  epistle  and 
Paul's. 

If  Paul  did  not  write  the  letter,  who  did  ? 
Wellhausen  remarked  about  Genesis  xiv,  the  Mel- 
chizedec  chapter,  that  it  is,  like  Melchizedec, 
"  without  father,  without  mother,  without  pedigree." 
The  same  remark  might  be  made  about  the  epistle 
"  To  the  Hebrews."  It  is  not  merely  that  the 
book  is  anonymous  :  anonymity  is  a  characteristic 
of  a  large  proportion  of  the  writings  both  of  the 
Old  Testament  and  the  New  ;  but  not  the  least 
impressive  feature  in  this  piece  of  lofty  eloquence 
and  suggestive  Christian  thinking  is  the  almost 
complete  absence  of  autobiographical  references, 
direct  or  indirect.  Egotism,  of  which  Paul  has 
been  accused,  is  surely  the  last  charge  one  would 
bring  against  this  writer.  His  metaphors,  by 
which  a  writer  sometimes  gives  a  clue  to  his 
environment  or  his  experiences,  are  singularly 
unrevealing.  Even  his  sea  metaphors,  such  as 
"  drift  away  "  (ii.  i),  and  "  anchor  of  the  soul  " 
(vi.  19)  are  of  a  kind  which,  in  the  countries  round 
the  Mediterranean,  would  be  as  familiar  to  those 
who  stayed  ashore  as  to  those  who  made  frequent 
voyages. 

All  the  names  that  have  been  proposed  are 
obvious  guesses,  the  modern  suggestions  frankly 
so.     Luther's  revival  of  the  theory  of  Apollos  as 

18 


An   Unknown   Author 

author  has  attracted  widespread  attention  ;  and 
Harnack's  suggestion  that  Priscilla  wrote  the  book 
in  conjunction  with  Aquila  is  of  great  interest.  In 
both  instances  the  New  Testament  accounts  of 
these  people  explain  the  attractiveness  of  the  sug- 
gestions ;  while  in  the  case  of  Priscilla  there  is 
the  further  claim  that  Paul's  antipathy  to  the 
prominence  of  women  in  the  Church  accounts  for 
the  veil  of  obscurity  thrown  over  the  authorship. 
All  we  can  say  is,  that  on  the  unwarranted  assump- 
tion that  the  epistle  was  written  by  someone  known 
to  us  from  the  pages  of  the  New  Testament,  some 
one  of  these  guesses  may  be  correct.  Our  ignor- 
ance of  the  history  of  the  scattered  Christian 
Churches  in  the  later  decades  of  the  first  Christian 
century  greatly  increases  the  probability  that  the 
writer  is  not  otherwise  known  to  us. 


W 


CHAPTER    II 
TO   UNKNOWN   READERS 

(4)  If  the  traditional  ascription  of  the  authorship 
to  Paul,  accepted  by  the  standard  English  versions, 
was  only  a  conjecture,  this  seems  to  be  true  also 
of  the  other  tradition,  that  the  recipients  of  the 
letter  were  "  Hebrews  "  or  Jewish  Christians.  It 
was  natural  to  suppose  that  a  document  which 
"  proved "  all  its  points  by  reference  to  Old 
Testament  texts,  and  found  in  Jewish  ritual  a 
parable  and  foreshadowing  of  the  Christian  Gospel, 
a  document  moreover  which  ignores  all  religions 
except  the  Jewish  and  the  Christian,  was  meant 
for  men  of  Jewish  antecedents.  Yet  in  recent 
years  the  difficulties  of  this  apparently  obvious 
theory  have  been  felt  increasingly.  We  now  know 
that  the  use  the  book  makes  of  the  Old  Testament 
gives  no  certain  inference  as  to  the  pre-conversion 
status  of  the  readers.  Even  if  we  did  not  know 
that  Gentile  Christians  could  argue  in  this  way 
from  the  Old  Testament,  modern  missionary  experi- 
ence makes  it  abundantly  clear  that  converts  from 
the  world  religions,  to  whom  but  a  little  while 
previously   the    Old    Testament   was    hardly   even 


To    Unknown  Readers 

a  name,  readily  learn  to  regard  it  as  one  of  their 
sacred  books,  and  to  give  to  it  a  reverence  at  least 
as  great  as  that  which  they  had  for  the  scriptures 
of  their  former  religion. 

Moreover,  if  the  readers  were  Jewish  Christians 
tempted  to  fall  back  into  Judaism,  we  should  expect 
the  author  to  try  to  strengthen  their  faith  that 
Jesus  was  the  Christ  ;  but  from  the  beginning  he 
simply  assumes  this.  We  should  expect  him  to 
try  to  revive  their  belief  that  Jesus  had  risen  ;  but 
this  is  common  ground  between  him  and  them. 
His  theme  all  through  is  the  eternal,  heavenly 
Christ,  but  his  only  actual  reference  to  the  resur- 
rection of  Jesus  is  made  in  a  single  phrase  (xiii.  20). 
If  he  feared  for  his  readers  the  attraction  of  Jewish 
ritual,  his  polemic  would  surely  have  had  reference 
to  the  ritual  of  his  own  day  ;  but  there  is  no  indica- 
tion in  the  book  that  either  writer  or  readers  knew 
anything  of  contemporary  Jewish  religious  cere- 
monies. The  ritual  of  which  he  speaks  is  that  of 
the  ancient  tabernacle  of  the  wilderness  days.  His 
knowledge  of  it  is  gathered  entirely  from  a  study 
of  the  Old  Testament  and  from  tradition.  The 
temple  is  never  mentioned,  and  is  so  far  without 
the  author's  ken  that  we  cannot  even  make  out 
whether  it  was  still  standing  in  his  day. 

On  the  assumption  that  there  was  among  the 
readers  a  Jewish  propaganda  such  as  Paul  had  to 
face,  we  should  expect  references  to  such  questions 
as  circumcision  and  the  distinction  between  "clean  " 

21 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

and  "  unclean "  foods.  Of  these  there  is  no 
mention,  nor  is  there  any  discussion  of  the  relations 
between  Jewish  and  Gentile  Christians.  Judging 
from  the  complete  silence  of  the  writer,  the  Jewish- 
Gentile  controversy,  if  it  had  ever  taken  place  in 
this  Church,  was  dead  and  perhaps  forgotten. 

If  the  facts  do  not  bear  out  the  theory  that  the 
recipients  of  the  epistle  were  Jewish  Christians  with 
leanings  towards  a  reversion  to  Judaism,  as  little 
do  they  bear  out  the  theory  that  they  were  Gentile 
Christians  tempted  to  fall  back  into  paganism.  In 
that  case  the  writer  would  surely  have  felt  impelled 
to  lay  again  a  foundation  of  elementary  Christian 
truth.  This,  however,  he  deliberately  refuses  to 
do  (vi.  i).  From  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  the 
epistle  the  whole  Gentile  world  is  almost  completely 
ignored.  There  is  nothing  even  remotely  approach- 
ing the  first  chapter  of  "  Romans,"  for  example. 
Indeed,  one  of  the  problems  of  the  epistle  is  just 
the  difficulty  of  conjecturing  in  what  Christian 
Church  in  the  latter  part  of  the  first  Christian 
century  there  could  be  a  great  Christian  teacher 
who  was  hardly  conscious  that  a  world  existed 
outside  both  of  Judaism  and  of  Christianity. 

That  he  nowhere  suggests  the  duty  of  evangel- 
ising the  non-Christian  world  is  no  more  strange 
in  his  letter  than  it  is  in  the  letters  of  Paul.  It 
may  well  be  however  that  his  apparent  indifference 
to  the  entire  Gentile  world  is  only  apparent  and 
is  really  an  example  of  self-restraint.     The  pagan 

22 


To   Unknown  Readers 

world,  especially  the  Roman  government,  was 
already  taking  on  the  character  of  the  anti-Christ. 
In  his  references  to  the  persecutions  of  the  Christians, 
past  and  future,  there  is  not  one  bitter  word.  How 
dark  and  deep  the  feelings  of  persecuted  Christians 
could  be  we  learn  from  the  book  of  "  Revelation." 
That  this  writer  and  his  readers  were  under  a 
temptation,  the  same  in  kind  if  less  in  degree,  gives 
all  the  more  significance  to  his  silence. 

Much  misunderstanding  of  the  epistle  has  been 
due  to  the  assumption  that  it  is  a  polemic,  that 
each  position  of  the  author  is  asserted  in  opposition 
to  a  contrary  tendency  among  the  readers.  We 
have  already  seen  that  this  is  not  so  with  regard 
to  the  main  points  of  the  argument.  There  can 
have  been  no  temptation  among  the  readers  to 
revive  the  long  obsolete  tabernacle  ritual.  The 
teaching  on  the  high-priesthood  of  Jesus  is  not 
given  to  correct  misapprehension.  It  is,  as  he 
himself  describes  it  (v.  I  iff.),  higher  instruction 
in  Christian  truth,  into  which  he  hopes,  almost 
against  hope,  that  they  are  fit  to  be  initiated.  This 
teaching  he  gives  as  an  intellectual  and  spiritual 
stimulus. 

The  readers,  we  gather,  were  becoming  dis- 
heartened, falling  into  a  state  of  religious  lethargy. 
Towards  that  result  apparently  several  causes  had 
contributed.  They  had  borne  suffering  manfully, 
but  had  become  weary  of  it  ;  the  expected  return 
of  Jesus  had  not  taken  place,  but  things  went  on 

23 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

as  before  ;  their  profession  of  Christianity  led  to 
social  ostracism  and  contempt,  and  they  had  begun 
to  wonder  whether  it  was  all  worth  while.  There 
may  also  have  been  temptation  to  conform  to 
Jewish  practices,  or  to  the  ceremonial  of  the 
"  Mystery "  religions,  or  to  both.  They  were 
becoming  weak-kneed  and  limp  (xii.  12)  and 
needed  bracing  up. 

The  tonic  this  writer  supplies  is  a  piece  of  hard 
Christian  thinking.  He  believes  that  a  fuller 
understanding  of  the  Christian  message  will 
strengthen  their  moral  fibre  and  deepen  their 
spiritual  life.  Heinrici's  suggestion  that  the  epistle 
was  written  especially  for  a  group  of  evangelists  or 
teachers  does  not  seem  to  have  met  with  general 
acceptance.  The  theory  has  been  supported  on 
such  grounds  as  that  in  v.  12  the  writer  says  his 
readers  ought  to  be  teachers  ;  that  the  argument 
is  too  difficult  to  be  meant  for  ordinary  readers  ; 
and  that  warnings  against  sensual  sin,  such  as  we 
find  in  Paul's  epistles,  are  conspicuous  by  their 
absence. 

This  is  not  very  convincing.  In  v.  12  what  the 
writer  says  is,  that  on  account  of  the  time  that  has 
elapsed  since  their  conversion  (and  apparently  for 
no  other  reason)  they  ought  themselves  to  be 
teachers  ;  on  the  contrary,  they  still  need  elementary 
instruction.  The  argument  in  parts  is  difficult  ; 
but  is  it  any  more  difficult  than  many  sections  of 
Paul's  epistles  ?     One  of  the  wonders  of  the  New 


To   Unknown  Readers 

Testament  is  that  plain  men  and  women  were 
apparently  expected  to  understand  these  epistles 
when  read  aloud  in  public.  No  doubt  much  must 
be  allowed  for  intellectual  environment.  A  teacher 
reading  Wordsworth  with  a  class  of  schoolboys  in 
the  West  would  be  at  pains  to  explain  the  nature 
of  pantheistic  belief.  With  a  class  of  Indian  boys 
such  explanations  would  be  uncalled  for  ;  panthe- 
istic ideas  are  of  the  air  they  breathe.  Even 
allowing  for  this  consideration,  the  epistles  are  often 
difficult  reading.  Moreover,  the  writer  does  warn 
against  sensual  sin  (xii.  16  ;  xiii.  4).  The  readers 
are  invited  too  to  admonish  each  other  (x.  24f.), 
not  to  admonish  their  pupils  as  one  might  have 
expected  had  they  been  teachers. 

There  seems  to  be  some  ground  for  believing 
that  the  people  addressed  were  not  the  whole 
Christian  population  of  a  city,  but  a  smaller  and 
more  homogeneous  body,  perhaps  a  single  "  house 
Church  "  in  some  city  where  there  were  various 
such  Churches.  At  all  events  the  writer  can  speak 
as  if  his  readers  had  had  various  experiences  in 
common.  The  founders  of  the  Church  had  been 
men  who  themselves  had  heard  Jesus  (ii.  3)  ;  not 
long  after  their  conversion,  since  when  considerable 
time  had  elapsed,  the  readers  had  manfully  endured 
persecution  (x.  32ff.).  They  were  becoming  dis- 
couraged, however,  with  their  continual  sufferings 
(xii.  3fT.)  and  so  were  ceasing  to  attend  the  Christian 
meetings  (x.  25). 

25 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

Perhaps  the  strongest  argument  for  the  "  single 
congregation  "  theory  is  in  the  last  chapter,  where 
in  verse  17  the  readers  are  told  to  "obey  your 
leaders  and  submit  to  them,"  while  in  verse  24 
the  admonition  is  to  "  greet  all  your  leaders  and 
all  the  saints,"  which  might  very  well  mean  "  all 
the  Church  leaders  and  Church  members  in  the 
city  as  well  as  those  in  your  own  congregation." 
The  inference  however  cannot  be  drawn  with  any 
certainty,  and  the  homogeneity  presupposed  among 
the  readers  has  been  somewhat  exaggerated.  More 
than  once  he  allows  for  the  possibility  that  some  of 
them  will  stand  fast  while  others  yield  (iii.  12  ;  iv.  1). 

The  ambiguous  greeting  in  xiii.  24  from  "  the 
Italians,"  if  this  phrase  means  "  the  exiled  Italians 
who  are  with  me,"  taken  in  conjunction  with  the 
fact  that  the  first  extant  reference  to  the  epistle  is 
in  the  Roman  Clement,  strengthens  the  supposition, 
to  which  internal  evidence  lends  some  countenance, 
that  the  readers  were  a  house  Church  in  Rome. 

While  "  To  the  Hebrews  "  is  an  original  work, 
hardly  any  book  of  the  New  Testament  suffers 
more  when  it  is  dissociated  from  its  literary  relatives. 
The  commentaries  have  shown  with  great  fullness 
the  affinities  of  the  language  and  ideas  of  this 
writing  with  those,  for  example,  of  the  Wisdom 
Literature  and  of  Philo.  To  take  only  one  or  two 
illustrations,  Philo  had  already  identified  Melchize- 
dec  with  the  Logos,  and  he  speaks  of  the  Logos 
as   interceding   with   God.     The   interpretation    of 

26 


To   Unknown   Readers 

the  names  Melchizedec  and  Salem  (vii.  2)  is  found 
both  in  Josephus  and  in  Philo.  Philo,  like  this 
writer,  had  been  puzzled  by  the  idea  of  God 
swearing  by  Himself,  as  in  Gen.  xxii.  16  ;  but 
unlike  this  writer  he  concluded  that  the  expression 
was  an  anthropomorphism. 

As  for  the  date,  in  "  The  First  Epistle  of  Clement 
to  the  Corinthians,"  written  about  the  middle  of 
the  last  decade  of  the  first  Christian  century,  we 
find  the  words  "  who,  being  the  brightness  of  his 
majesty,  is  by  so  much  greater  than  the  angels,  as 
he  hath  inherited  a  more  excellent  name  "  (xxxvi.); 
and  in  the  same  chapter  "  who  maketh  his  angels 
spirits  and  his  ministers  a  flame  of  fire."  These 
quotations  are  only  two  out  of  many  that  make  it 
practically  certain  that  Clement  had  read  "  To  the 
Hebrews  "  and  suggest  that  the  epistle  had  been 
in  circulation  for  some  time.  Apart  from  that,  all 
estimates  of  the  date  of  the  epistle  are  conjectural. 
The  Church  had  been  founded  by  ear-witnesses 
of  Jesus,  but  that  might  have  happened  at  any 
time  after  Pentecost.  Even  if  we  could  be  sure 
that  the  Timothy  mentioned  in  xiii.  23  was  the 
friend  of  Paul,  that  gives  us  no  new  clue  to  the 
date.  Perhaps  the  general  impression  we  get 
from  the  book  and  its  vague  historical  references, 
combined  with  its  use  by  "  First  Clement,"  suggests 
some  date  early  in  the  last  quarter  of  the  first 
century. 


27 


CHAPTER  III 
LIVING    ISSUES 

This  epistle,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  can  hardly 
be  generally  popular.  There  are  a  few  passages 
like  the  introductory  sentences  with  their  rolling 
eloquence  and  the  dazzling  splendour  of  their 
thought,  the  concluding  verses  of  chapter  iv.  that 
tell  timid  and  tempted  sufferers  of  their  sympa- 
thetic high  priest,  and  the  song  of  the  Immortals 
in  chapter  xi.,  which  the  Church  counts  among 
her  most  cherished  treasures.  The  same  can 
hardly  be  said  of  the  epistle  as  a  whole,  in  spite 
of  the  extent  to  which  its  leading  ideas  have 
influenced  alike  the  prayers  and  the  praises  of  the 
Church.  The  difficulty  of  the  argument,  the 
remoteness  of  the  thought-images,  especially  those 
connected  with  the  tabernacle  ritual,  and  the 
unconvincing  Biblical  exegesis  which  the  writer 
inherits  from  the  Alexandrians,  are  all  stumbling- 
blocks  in  the  way  of  the  modern  reader. 

Perhaps  the  chief  obstacle  to  a  wider  use  of  the 
epistle  is  our  difficulty  in  seeing  what  the  writer 
is  aiming  at,  or  what,  when  we  have  read  to  the 
end,  he  has  accomplished.      It  is  not  only  that  the 

28 


Living   Issues 

imagery  he  uses  is  foreign  to  us  ;  he  seems  to 
move  in  a  world  quite  unlike  our  own.  Only 
occasionally  do  the  orbits  of  his  thought  and  of 
ours  intersect  ;  though  when  that  does  happen,  as 
in  the  passages  we  have  mentioned,  we  feel  we  are 
in  the  presence  of  a  master  Christian  mind. 

It  is  very  unfortunate  that  the  form  into  which 
the  author  has  cast  his  thought  has  tended  to 
estrange  him  from  us.  The  questions  with  which 
he  deals  are  the  very  questions  that  thrust  them- 
selves so  insistently  on  our  own  generation  ;  and 
while  the  answers  that  we  give  differ  in  form  from 
his  answers,  he  has  at  least  shown  us  with  great 
effectiveness  the  truths  that  have  to  be  conserved 
if  the  Christian  religion  is  to  be  the  saving  power 
of  God.  The  Church,  when  it  takes  its  missionary 
task  as  seriously  as  does  the  Church  of  our  age,  is 
compelled  to  face  the  question  :  In  what  spirit  is 
the  Church  to  approach  the  non-Christian  world  ? 
Until  comparatively  recently  there  was  a  tendency, 
perhaps  exaggerated  in  retrospect,  to  denounce  the 
non-Christian  religions  as  things  of  evil,  and  to 
ask  the  convert  to  begin  his  public  career  as  a 
Christian  by  renouncing  them.  To-day  it  is  per- 
haps more  common  to  emphasise  that  God  has 
never  in  any  part  of  His  world  left  Himself  with- 
out a  witness  ;  to  believe  that  the  world  religions 
are  stages,  more  backward  or  more  advanced,  in 
the  human  search  for  God,  or  rather  in  the  Divine 
search  for  man  ;    and  that  Christianity  is   not  so 

29 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

much  the  supplanter  of  the  other  religions  as  the 
reality  of  which  they  were  the  shadowy  prophecies. 

The  best-known  example  of  a  systematic  attempt 
to  expound  this  point  of  view  is  that  in  which 
Dr.  Farquhar  tries  to  show  that  Christianity  is  the 
11  Crown  of  Hinduism."  That  is  precisely  the  atti- 
tude which  the  author  of  "  To  the  Hebrews  "  takes 
up  with  regard  to  Judaism.  He  shares  with  the 
prophets  and  with  the  most  uncompromising  of 
modern  missionaries  the  view  that  there  is  no  efficacy 
in  animal  sacrifice,  that  it  has  no  power  to  reach  the 
conscience  ;  yet  to  him  the  Levitical  sacrificial 
ritual,  especially  the  ritual  of  the  Day  of  Atone- 
ment, is  a  parable  and  a  prophecy  of  the  work  of 
Jesus  in  opening  up  men's  way  to  God. 

The  readers  of  the  epistle  had  not  exactly  given 
up  their  Christian  faith  ;  on  the  contrary,  they  had 
suffered  much  and  given  much  in  defence  of  it  ; 
but  they  had  in  large  measure  lost  the  enthusiasm 
of  their  first  love.  Is  not  that  true  of  multitudes 
in  our  own  day  ?  The  author's  prescription  for 
their  case  is  twofold.  On  the  one  hand,  he  urges 
them  to  live  up  to  the  highest  standard  of  Christian 
ethics  :  discipline,  kindness,  family  purity,  patient 
endurance  of  wrong,  contentment  ;  whatever  else 
goes  these  must  not  go. 

But  along  with  this  he  asks  them  to  think  out 
afresh  the  whole  question  of  the  relation  of  Jesus 
to  sin,  to  God,  to  themselves.  We  often  account 
for  the  indifference  of  the  average  Church  member 

3° 


Living  Issues 

to  the  foreign  enterprise  of  the  Church,  by  saying  : 
"  If  they  only  knew  .  .  ."  But  the  end  of  that 
sentence  is  not  only  the  condition  of  a  people 
whose  life  is  uninspired  by  Jesus.  If  they  only 
knew  what  Jesus  has  meant  to  their  own  people, 
considered  what  He  has  been  and  is  ready  to  be 
to  themselves,  the  new  knowledge  would  rever- 
berate through  all  their  lives. 

Books  are  written  to-day  on  the  finality  of  the 
Christian  religion.  The  study  especially  of  the 
non-Christian  religions  is  supposed  to  have  put 
Christianity  on  its  defence  in  its  claim  that  Jesus 
is  the  perfect  and  the  final  revelation  of  God. 
The  proof  of  this  same  thesis  is  one  of  the  chief 
aims  of  the  epistle.  It  is  true  that  it  portrays 
Christianity  against  the  background  of  only  one 
aspect  of  Judaism,  but  its  method  is  valid  always. 
The  writer  shows  that  Jesus  has  actually  done  the 
one  thing  that  men  needed  to  have  done,  the  thing 
that  all  religion  professes  to  do.  When  men  tell 
us  of  a  new  religion  that  will  be  some  kind  of 
amalgam  of  existing  religions,  we  are  entitled  to 
ask  them  :  In  what  way  is  God's  revelation  of 
Himself  in  Jesus  defective  ?  What  could  a  new 
revelation  do  for  us  that  Jesus  has  not  done  ? 

In  their  despondency  and  spiritual  sluggishness 
the  readers  of  this  epistle  were  tempted  to  forsake 
the  Christian  gatherings,  as  multitudes  in  our  day 
are  neglecting  them.  The  writer  warns  them  of 
the  danger.     In  religion  as  in  all  life,  in  worship 

3* 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

as  in  suffering,  we  need  each  other.  If  we  have 
nothing  to  get,  and  only  the  blindest  could  say 
that,  yet  we  have  something  to  give. 

In  another  aspect  the  epistle  is  in  accord  with 
the  thought  of  our  time.  We  like  to  think  that 
we  are  no  longer  deceived  by  the  outward  show 
of  things,  by  titles  and  uniforms  and  an  air  of 
antiquity  ;  that  we  value  our  officials  for  their 
work,  not  for  their  office  ;  our  institutions  for 
what  they  are,  not  for  what  they  have  been.  In 
the  very  centre  of  the  teaching  of  this  epistle  is 
the  truth  that  the  only  real  priest  is  the  priest 
"  after  the  order  of  Melchizedec,"  whose  worth 
lies  in  himself,  not  in  his  ancestry  nor  in  anything 
adventitious.  This  attitude  dominates  the  entire 
epistle.  The  only  Church  dignitaries  mentioned 
are  called  by  the  indefinite  term  "  leaders  "  (xiii.  7, 
17).  No  official  name  is  ever  used,  and  the  word 
apostle  seems  to  be  almost  deliberately  avoided 
(ii.  3).  There  is  no  clear  reference  to  baptism 
(not  vi.  2,  nor  x.  32),  nor  to  the  Lord's  Supper,  nor 
to  the  Lord's  day. 

The  absence  of  unambiguous  mention  of  the 
sacraments  is  in  part  explained  by  the  general  trend 
of  the  epistle.  Sacraments  are  parables  ;  the  Judaic 
age  of  parable  has  now  given  place  to  the  Christian 
age  of  realities.  Yet  the  author's  attitude  to  them 
is  of  a  piece  with  his  attitude  to  all  things  and 
people  official.  If  the  Christian  gatherings  of 
x.  25  are  stated  meetings  for  worship,  we  are  left 

32 


Living   Issues 

to  infer  this.  The  high-priesthood  of  Jesus  is  so 
described  that  for  one  who  has  followed  and 
accepted  the  argument,  it  is  unthinkable  that  there 
can  be  a  human  priest  in  the  Christian  Church. 
"  Leaders "  there  may  be  but  no  "  priest "  to 
stand  between  the  worshipper  and  his  God,  or  in 
any  way  profess  to  represent  men  before  God. 

The  theological  part  of  the  epistle  has  perennial 
value  because  it  is  an  interpretation  of  an  essen- 
tially Christian  experience.  Using  the  categories 
of  an  ancient  ritual,  the  author  sets  forth  what 
Jesus  had  been  to  himself,  and  to  the  men  who 
thought  with  him  ;  essentially  what  Jesus  has 
been  to  His  followers  in  all  ages.  He  and  they 
had  felt  a  barrier  between  themselves  and  God  : 
that  barrier  they  knew  was  their  own  sin.  Jesus, 
one  of  ourselves,  bone  of  our  bone  and  flesh  of  our 
flesh,  had  lived  a  life  of  such  moral  perfection, 
beauty  and  power,  that  death,  the  sphere  in  which 
sin  reigns,  had  no  jurisdiction  over  Him.  This 
Jesus,  though  our  brother,  is  yet  God  manifest  in 
the  flesh.  He  has  torn  asunder  the  veil  that  hid  God 
from  human  perception.  He  is  our  Captain,  going 
on  before,  and  where  He  leads  He  calls  on  us  to 
follow.  All  who  accept  His  leadership  can  now 
"  draw  near  unto  God."  He  Himself  is  the  Way, 
the  new  and  living  Way  to  God. 

Whatever  we  may  think  of  his  theory  of  the 
Atonement  (though  strictly  speaking  he  has  no 
theory  of  the  Atonement  ;    he  takes  for  granted 

33  c 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

the  efficacy  of  sacrifice)  this  writer  gets  down  to 
the  roots  of  things  when  he  tells  us  that  we  have 
not  that  purity  without  which  we  cannot  see  God, 
and  that  of  ourselves  we  can  never  win  that  purity. 
Through  what  Jesus  has  done  for  us  in  His  life, 
and  especially  in  His  death,  we  are  delivered  from 
fear  and  all  that  shackles  us,  given  a  new  mastery 
over  ourselves,  a  new  confidence  in  the  presence 
of  God  and  a  new  sense  of  fellowship  with  Him. 

In  this  epistle,  as  hardly  anywhere  else  even  in 
the  New  Testament,  do  we  feel  ourselves  lifted 
above  ourselves,  out  of  the  sphere  of  the  sensuous, 
the  petty,  the  passing,  into  the  realm  of  the  time- 
less, of  the  unseen  things  that  abide.  The  trend 
of  the  writer's  mind  is  shown  by  those  ever- 
recurring  words  and  phrases  which,  with  different 
shades  of  meaning,  point  to  the  unshaken  kingdom 
of  eternal  reality  :  the  living  Word,  the  living 
God,  the  living  Way,  God's  promises,  God's  oath, 
perfection,  the  city  with  foundations,  the  new 
Jerusalem  ;  and  the  host  of  comparatives,  in 
reality  superlatives,  that  tell  us  a  new  and  better 
era  has  dawned.  The  Christian  religion  is  final 
in  this  sense,  that  what  Jesus  is  no  other  can 
transcend,  what  He  has  done  no  other  can  do, 
and  there  is  no  need  that  it  should  ever  be  done 
again. 

The  writer  answers  too  the  question  men  some- 
times ask  :  How  can  a  Man,  appearing  in  time, 
accomplish  that  which  is  valid  for  all  time  ?     Can 

34 


Living   Issues 

we  ever  hope  for  a  more  effective  answer  than  this 
epistle  gives  :  that  which  Christ  did,  He  did  "  in 
the  spirit  of  the  eternal  "  ?  J  (ix.  14).  Jesus  came 
to  be  and  Jesus  died  ;  but  the  Christ  is  timeless, 
the  spirit  of  the  Christ  is  wrought  into  the  very 
fibre  of  the  world  ;  the  Christ  is  the  radiance  of 
God's  glory,  the  impress  of  His  substance  ;  in 
the  Christ  torn  on  the  Cross  we  see,  as  nowhere 
else,,  the  timeless  sacrificial  love  of  God  for  men. 
At  the  beginning  of  His  ministry  Jesus  saw  the 
heavens  parted  in  twain  (Mark  i.  10).  All  through 
His  ministry  He  had  unbroken  communion  with 
God.  When  the  struggle  and  the  pain  were  over 
He  took  His  seat  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty 
on  High.  Because  the  heavens  were  opened  for 
the  Captain  of  our  salvation  they  are  open  for  us. 
11  Let  us  then  draw  near  with  boldness  to  the 
throne  of  grace." 

1  Dr.  Moffatt's  translation. 


35 


CHAPTER    IV 

GOD    SPEAKING   THROUGH    A   SON 
(i.   1-4) 

In  its  lofty  doctrine  of  Christ  the  carefully  worded 
and  deeply  impressive  prologue  reminds  us  of  the 
prologue  to  the  fourth  Gospel  ;  but  more  perhaps 
than  in  any  other  book  of  the  New  Testament  do 
the  introductory  words  challenge  contrast  with  the 
opening  message  of  the  Bible.  In  the  beginning, 
God  :  at  the  end  of  the  age  God  has  spoken  in 
a  Son.  In  the  beginning  God  made  the  heaven 
and  the  earth  :  in  this  work  of  creation  His  agent 
was  the  Son.  God  made  all  things  :  He  made 
the  Son  heir  of  all  things.  Through  all  the 
creation  story  God's  glory  shines  :  the  Son  is  the 
radiance  of  that  glory.  "  God  said,"  and  it  was 
done  :  it  is  by  "  the  word  of  His  power  "  that 
the  Son  sustains  all  things.  When  the  work  of 
creation  was  finished  sin  entered  in  and  separated 
man  from  God  :  at  the  end  of  the  age  the  Son 
won  for  men  purification  from  sins.  In  the  begin- 
ning God  appeared  in  lonely  splendour  :  at  the 
end  the  Son  sat  down  at  tne  right  hand  of  the 
Majesty  on  high. 

36 


God  Speaking  Through  a  Son 

Already  in  the  Introduction  we  find  some  of 
those  features  that  strike  us  most  in  the  epistle. 
The  writer  has  as  high  a  doctrine  of  the  "person  " 
of  Christ  as  Paul  or  John,  but  he  does  not  teach 
this  doctrine  ;  he  assumes  it  as  common  ground 
between  him  and  his  hearers.  So  prominent  is 
the  high-priesthood  of  Jesus  in  the  epistle  that  we 
are  tempted  to  think  this  was  the  category  under 
which  the  author  primarily  thought  of  Jesus.  The 
Introduction  reminds  us  that  he  accepted  the 
current  Christology  of  the  Church  ;  that  to  him 
high  priest  is  not  a  substitute  for  but  an  addition 
to  the  titles  the  Church  was  heaping  on  Jesus  ; 
that  for  him  too  Jesus  was  the  Christ,  the  Lord, 
the  unique  son  of  God,  the  vicegerent  of  God,  the 
living  embodiment  of  the  glory  of  God,  whose 
earthly  existence  was  but  an  episode  in  His  life. 
If  he  does  not  call  Jesus  Saviour,  yet  as  high  priest 
He  does  the  work  of  Saviour. 

Here  as  throughout  the  book  some  of  the  phrases 
used  are  borrowed.  Certain  of  the  expressions 
which  in  this  passage  refer  to  Jesus  (who  is  not 
here  named)  had  already  been  applied  to  the  Logos 
or  to  (personified)  Wisdom.  Thus  in  the  book  of 
"  Wisdom "  Wisdom  is  called  a  "  reflection  of 
eternal  light."  Yet  as  employed  by  the  writer 
"  to  the  Hebrews "  they  are  not  stock  phrases, 
used  conventionally  or  as  a  concession  to  orthodoxy. 
They  are  of  the  substance  of  his  thought  and  of 
his  argument.     If  we  would  understand  the  book 

37 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

as  a  whole  it  is  even  more  necessary  than  in  the 
case  of  the  fourth  Gospel  to  read  it  in  the  light  of 
the  prologue. 

In  the  very  first  line  the  author  makes  clear  his 
attitude  to  the  Old  Testament.  Jesus  had  chal- 
lenged the  permanent  validity  of  certain  sections 
of  the  Old  Testament  ritual,  and  the  sufficiency  as 
a  moral  guide  of  the  ethical  precepts  of  the  Law. 
Later  the  far  more  fundamental  question  was  to  be 
raised,  whether  the  God  of  the  Old  Testament  is 
the  God  who  is  the  Father  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. 
To  this  writer  the  question  does  not  even  occur  ; 
nor  does  he  contemplate  that  such  questions  will 
occur  to  his  readers.  To  them  as  to  him,  and  to 
all  the  Christians  of  the  first  age,  the  Greek  Old 
Testament  is  the  Word  of  God  to  be  received 
unquestioningly. 

The  God  who  has  spoken  in  these  last  days 
through  His  Son  is  the  same  God  who  spoke  in 
the  early  days  through  the  fathers.  It  is  not  only 
that  God  speaks  on  the  sacred  page  ;  He  spoke 
through  the  men  of  whom  the  sacred  record  tells 
us.  It  is  true  that  the  "  revelation  "  was  piecemeal, 
here  a  glimpse  and  there  a  vision  ;  true  also  that 
it  came  in  a  rich  variety  of  forms  :  through  victory 
and  defeat,  through  the  institution  of  a  legal  code 
or  a  great  national  deliverance  ;  that  the  messengers 
were  poets,  prophets  and  "  wise  men,"  soldiers  and 
statesmen.  Through  it  all  God  was  speaking  ; 
but  God's  messages,  fragmentary  and  many-sided 

38 


God   Speaking  Through  a  Son 

as  they  were,  have  been  summed  up  in  His  final 
Word,  the  Son,  who  has  revealed  to  us  the  very 
self  of  God  as  God  has  never  been  revealed  to  us 
before  ;  Light  of  His  Light,  Impress  of  His  very 
Being. 

We  note  already  in  the  prologue  the  curious 
way  in  which  the  whole  Gentile  world  is  ignored 
throughout  the  book,  the  complete  absence  of  any 
suggestion  that  God  had  given  even  a  dim  twilight 
revelation  of  Himself  outside  of  Judaism.  The 
analogy  of  the  rest  of  the  epistolary  literature  of 
the  New  Testament  discourages  the  otherwise 
tempting  idea  that  the  veil  drawn  over  the  Gentile 
world  is  an  indication  of  a  lack  of  missionary 
enthusiasm,  which  might  account  in  part  for  the 
state  of  depressed  religious  vitality  into  which  the 
readers  had  fallen. 

The  prologue  provides  us  with  another  pheno- 
menon which  puzzles  us  not  only  in  this  epistle 
but  in  a  large  part  of  the  New  Testament  literature, 
the  chief  exception  being  the  first  three  Gospels. 
The  Jesus  who  is  the  centre  of  the  writer's  thoughts 
is  not  the  Jesus  who  walked  the  streets  of  Jeru- 
salem and  the  country  lanes  of  Galilee,  who  healed 
the  sick  and  went  about  doing  good,  and  sought 
to  lead  men  to  the  Father.  He  is  a  heavenly  figure 
who  came  from  eternity  and  went  to  eternity,  a 
being  in  some  sense  God,  though  this  writer,  like 
Paul,  is  careful  to  distinguish  Him  from  God,  one 
the  chief  event  in  whose  life  was  His  death.     It 

39 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

is  true,  as  we  shall  see  later,  that  this  writer  insists, 
as  Paul  and  John  do  not,  on  the  real  manhood, 
the  weakness,  the  sufferings,  and  temptation  of  the 
human  Jesus.  Yet  to  him  as  to  them  this  human 
life  was  only  an  interlude  in  the  eternal  life  of  a 
Being  whose  place  was  eternally  with  God. 

An  immense  amount  of  research  work  has  shown 
us  the  origin  of  the  categories  that  were  so  freely 
applied  to  Jesus  by  the  early  Church,  and  in  par- 
ticular has  made  it  not  improbable  that  in  the 
case  of  certain  of  them,  like  "  Lord  "  and  "Saviour," 
some  of  the  associations  that  these  titles  had  in 
the  world  religions  may  have  clung  to  them  in  the 
minds  of  Gentile  Christians,  even  when  applied  to 
Jesus.  It  is  no  doubt  something  to  know  where 
the  categories  came  from  that  enabled  the  first 
generations  of  Christians  to  explain  in  some 
measure  to  themselves  and  others  what  Jesus 
meant  to  them.  The  fact  to  be  reckoned  with  is 
that  men  who  had  known  Jesus,  and  others  who 
knew  of  Him  from  them,  did  apply  these  titles  to 
Jesus  in  His  own  generation. 

Nevertheless  it  is,  and  perhaps  will  always  remain, 
something  of  a  puzzle  that  in  their  writings  and 
public  utterances  they  made  so  few  references  to 
the  earthly  life  of  Jesus.  For  this  no  doubt  one 
chief  reason  was  that  the  death  of  Jesus  was  not  to 
them  the  catastrophe  that  it  seems  to  the  unbeliever. 
Jesus  Himself  seems  to  have  encouraged  His 
followers    to    think    of   death    as    a    comparatively 

40 


God   Speaking  Through  a  Son 

unimportant  event  in  the  history  of  one  who  has 
the  life  which  is  life  indeed  ;  and  this  part  of 
His  teaching  seems  to  have  gone  home.  The' 
writers  of  the  New  Testament  do  not  think  of 
Jesus  in  the  past  tense  but  in  the  present.  To 
them  He  is  alive  for  evermore,  and  with  Him 
they  have  communion  as  real  and  effective  as  His 
friends  had  in  the  days  of  His  flesh  ;  nay,  more 
real  and  effective. 

Again,  we  have  always  to  place  all  the  other 
New  Testament  writings  against  the  background 
of  the  first  three  Gospels.  While  Paul  was 
engaged  on  his  missionary  tours,  and  while  he  was 
writing  his  epistles,  the  stories  of  Jesus'  sayings, 
doings,  and  experience  were  being  treasured, 
sifted,  compared,  and  collected.  It  is  true  that 
in  the  case  of  Paul  especially,  we  can  easily  show 
that  he  must  have  known  a  great  deal  about  the 
facts  of  Jesus'  life  ;  by  careful  search  through 
his  writings  we  can  establish,  as  has  often  been 
done,  the  fact  that  he  did  know  a  great  deal  more 
than  appears  on  a  superficial  reading.  But  the 
great  point  is  that  the  heavenly  Christ  of  Paul 
presupposes  the  Jesus  of  whom  we  read  in  the 
pages  of  Matthew,  Mark,  and  Luke.  I  Corin- 
thians, for  example,  is  simply  soaked  in  the 
Synoptic  tradition.  And  is  not  the  conception  of 
the  great  high  priest  who  feels  with  us  and  for  us, 
redolent  of  the  memory  of  the  Jesus  who,  in  the 
phrase    of    Matthew's    fine    quotation,    "  Himself 

4* 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

took  our  infirmities  and  bare  our  sicknesses " 
(viii.  1 7)  ?  We  sometimes  forget,  too,  that  the 
Jesus  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  is  a  rediscovery  of 
our  own  generation.  The  Christology  of  the  New 
Testament  was  not  the  stumbling-block  to  our 
fathers  that  it  is  to  so  many  in  our  day. 

It  was  a  true  instinct  that  led  the  author  of 
"  To  the  Hebrews "  and  other  New  Testament 
writers  to  emphasise,  as  they  did,  the  question  of 
what  we  call  "  the  person  of  Christ."  If  Jesus 
was  only  one  of  ourselves,  making  one  more  guess 
at  truth,  then  the  appeal  of  Christianity  is  im- 
measurably weakened.  The  Introduction  claims 
that  the  voice  of  God  has  never  been  silent  in  the 
world,  that  the  world  did  not  then  first  become 
Christian  when  Jesus  entered  it,  that  the  music 
of  the  spheres  as  they  revolve  is  Christian  music. 
To  know  Jesus  is  to  know  God. 


42 


CHAPTER    V 

MORE   THAN   A    MINISTERING   SPIRIT 
p.  5-i4) 

From  verse  4  to  the  end  of  chap.  i.  is  one  of  the 
sections  of  the  epistle  that  are  apt  to  strike  a 
modern  reader  as  barren.  Coming  after  the  magni- 
ficent prologue,  it  has  almost  the  effect  of  bathos. 
In  this  section  the  author  tries,  by  methods  of 
which  the  modern  exegetical  conscience  does  not 
approve,  to  demonstrate  a  point  that  does  not 
seem  to  us  worth  demonstrating,  a  point  which 
nevertheless  he  thinks  worthy  of  the  final  place  in 
the  Introduction  :  that  the  Son  is  superior  to  the 
angels,  the  measure  of  His  superiority  being  the 
excellence  of  the  name  He  has  "  inherited  "  (one 
of  the  author's  favourite  words)  in  comparison 
with  theirs. 

It  is  hardly  credible  that  this  section,  however 
remote  it  may  seem  from  the  problems  of  our 
time,  was  for  that  day  simply  a  piece  of  abstract 
and  pointless  theology.  It  deals  with  some  real 
difficulty  of  the  readers,  though  unfortunately  we 
have  lost  the  key  to  it.  Even  in  the  quotations  in 
this  section  the  author  can  take  for  granted  that 

43 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

he  carries  his  readers  with  him  when  he  assumes 
that  the  passages  he  quotes  refer  to  the  Messiah 
and  that  Jesus  was  the  Messiah.  But  there  seems 
to  have  been  a  tendency  to  regard  Jesus  as  an 
angel,  one  angel  among  the  others.  It  is  easy  for 
us  who  date  our  years  from  the  birth  of  Christ  to 
give  Jesus  in  our  thought  a  position  of  unchallenged 
supremacy.  To  realise  the  situation  we  have  to 
think  ourselves  back  into  the  time  when  the 
Christian  Church  was  still  in  its  infancy  and  tradi- 
tions were  only  gradually  being  established  ;  or 
when,  even  though  there  was  a  well-defined 
"  Christianity,"  any  particular  Church  might  be 
tempted  by  local  circumstances  to  develop  on  lines 
of  its  own. 

We  who  have  been  brought  up  in  the  atmosphere 
of  Western  thought  and  Western  science  are  apt 
to  think  of  people  whose  world  teems  with  angels 
and  spirits  as  abnormal  folk  who  are  intellectually 
outside  the  pale  ;  to  forget  that  it  is  we  with  our 
uncompromising  monotheism,  our  scientific  outlook 
and  our  sceptical  approach  to  the  whole  supra- 
natural  world  who  are  abnormal.  From  the  pages 
of  the  New  Testament  itself  we  can  see  the  large 
part  played  in  the  Jewish  thought  of  the  time  by 
the  belief  in  angels.  This  article  in  the  creed 
of  many  Jews  may  have  been  partly  of  Persian 
origin  ;  but  the  interposition  of  spirits,  good 
or  evil,  is  such  an  obvious  explanation  of  many 
of   the  otherwise  uninterpreted   facts  of  life,   that 

44 


More   Than  a   Ministering   Spirit 

in  no  case  need  we  assume  that  the  belief  is 
imported. 

The  idea  may  have  developed  partly  through  the 
unconscious  desire  to  provide  God  with  a  Court 
on  the  analogy  of  Oriental  potentates,  partly 
through  the  concentration  of  worship  in  a  single 
sanctuary  necessitating  heavenly  messengers  when 
men  away  from  the  central  sanctuary  would  com- 
municate with  God.  Angels  were  no  doubt  partly 
also  introduced  to  cross  the  gulf  that  men  had 
created  between  themselves  and  God  by  their 
increasing  sense  of  His  unapproachable  majesty. 
Jesus  apparently  accepted  many  of  the  current 
beliefs  in  angels,  but  in  spite  of  His  frequent 
references  to  them  they  play  practically  no  part 
in  His  ministry. 

Jesus'  consciousness  of  direct  communion  with 
God  left  no  room  and  no  need  for  intermediate 
agencies.  The  most  significant  passage  in  that 
connection  occurs  in  the  story  of  the  arrest,  where 
Matthew  tells  us  Jesus  refused  to  ask  for  the 
angelic  help  which  nevertheless  He  believed  was 
freely  at  His  disposal  (xxvi.  53).  The  negligible 
part  that  angels  play  during  the  actual  ministry 
of  Jesus  is  all  the  more  striking  in  view  of  the 
repeated  intervention  of  angels,  dreams,  and  visions 
in  the  story  of  His  birth,  infancy,  and  resur- 
rection. It  is  a  testimony  to  the  way  in  which 
a  real  picture  of  Him  dominated  the  tradition, 
even  when  that    tradition    was    handed    down    by 

45 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

men   who  were  only  too  ready  to  believe  in   the 
supernatural. 

From  the  epistle  to  the  Colossians  we  see  how 
very  real  the  danger  was  that  professed  Christians, 
before  they  realised  the  unique  significance  of 
Jesus  for  the  new  religion,  might  be  led  into  some 
form  of  angel  worship.  There  is  however  no 
certainty  that  the  readers  of  "  To  the  Hebrews  " 
were  tempted  to  any  angel  cult,  and  there  are  at 
least  two  other  possibilities.  Both  Paul  (Gal.  iii.  19) 
and  Stephen  (Acts  vii.  $3)  refer  to  a  Jewish  tradi- 
tion which  represented  angels  as  sharing  with  God 
in  the  giving  of  the  Law.  There  seem  to  have 
been  different  interpretations  of  this  tradition  : 
Paul  apparently  uses  this  angelic  intervention  to 
disparage  the  Law  ;  while  on  Stephen's  view 
angels,  by  handing  on  the  Law,  added  to  its  dignity 
and  so  to  the  offence  of  those  who  disobeyed  it.  It 
may  be  then  that  the  point  of  this  writer  is  that 
Jesus  is  superior  to  the  Law  typified  by  the  angels. 
Or  again,  the  angels  may  represent  the  whole 
material  world,  which  under  the  old  dispensation 
was  regarded  as  being  under  the  dominion  of 
angels,  each  nation  for  example  having  its  own 
guardian  angel. 

While  the  point  at  issue  may  not  be  absolutely 
clear,  it  seems  safe  to  say  that  the  writer  is  seeking 
to  safeguard  two  truths.  One  is  that  with  Jesus 
begins  an  absolutely  new  era  ;  the  old  world  of 
legal  institutions,  the  world  which  is  on  the  whole 

46 


More   Than   a   Ministering   Spirit 

material,  is  passing  away  ;  the  world  of  spiritual 
realities,  God's  world,  is  about  to  be  revealed. 
The  other  is  that  in  the  new  age  Jesus  remains 
supreme  at  God's  right  hand,  without  a  rival. 

If  the  point  the  writer  tries  to  make  in  this 
section  is  foreign  to  our  habits  of  thought,  the 
manner  in  which  he  proves  it  is  one  with  which 
we  are  only  too  familiar.  The  Old  Testament  is 
regarded  as  a  great  storehouse  of  proof-texts  ;  the 
proof  may  lie  more  in  the  apparent  relevance  of 
some  word  or  phrase  than  in  the  bearing  the  text 
has  on  the  passage  from  which  it  is  taken.  In 
extenuation  of  the  use  made  of  Scripture  in  this 
epistle  two  pleas  may  be  urged.  One,  the  more 
important,  is  that  for  the  author  the  Scripture 
quotations  are  not  the  real  proof  of  the  points  he 
makes.  He  employs  Scripture  rather  to  buttress 
a  conclusion  he  has  reached  by  quite  another  road. 
The  other  is  his  conviction  that  in  Scripture  God 
is  speaking  and  God's  word  must  be  fulfilled.  If 
it  is  not  fulfilled  in  its  original  signification,  it  is 
only  because  God  has  destined  for  it  a  larger  and 
later  fulfilment. 

i-  5 

First  he  gives  two  Scripture  quotations  to  prove 
that  the  name  Son  is  superior  to  the  name  Angel. 
In  the  second  psalm  someone,  whom  both  writer 
and  readers  regard,  and  perhaps  rightly  regard,  as 
the  Messiah,  is  addressed  by  God  in  the  terms  : 
11  Thou  art  my  Son  ;    to-day  have  I  become  thy 

47 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

father."  Angels,  he  claims,  are  never  called  Sons 
of  God.  (This  is  not  quite  correct  of  the  Hebrew 
Bible,  but  the  writer  used  the  Greek  Old  Testa- 
ment.) A  second  proof  is  then  brought  forward. 
When  David  proposed  to  build  a  temple  for  the 
ark,  Jahweh  declined  the  offer,  but,  speaking 
through  the  prophet  Nathan,  promised  to  establish 
the  kingdom  of  David's  "  seed."  "  I  will  be  his 
father  and  he  shall  be  my  son  "  (2  Sam.  vii.  14). 
(In  applying  this  text  to  the  Messiah  the  writer 
has  the  justification  that  the  context  does  seem  to 
show  that  from  the  beginning  the  words  were 
understood  to  have  a  wider  reference  than  to  any 
particular  Jewish  king.) 

i.  6 
Next  he  proceeds  to  establish  that  the  function 
of  the  Son  is  superior  to  the  function  of  the  angels 
as  His  name  is  superior  to  theirs.  At  the  end  of 
the  noble  Song  of  Moses  in  the  edition  of  the 
Greek  Bible  used  by  this  writer  a  phrase  occurs  : 
"  Let  God's  angels  worship  Him  "  (Deut.  xxxii.  43). 
Apparently  this  meant  "  Let  them  worship  God," 
but  this  writer  by  "  Him  "  understood  the  Messiah 
and  represented  the  verse  as  God's  introduction  of 
the  Messiah  to  the  world. 

i-  7 
Continuing    his    argument,   the    writer    quotes 
Psalm  civ.  4,  where  the  psalmist  says  that  God  "  turns 
his  angels  into  winds,  his  attendants  into  a  fiery 

48 


More   Than   a   Ministering   Spirit 

flame."  It  is  tempting  to  suppose  that  the  psalmist 
meant  that  God  uses  the  winds  as  His  messengers, 
a  flaming  fire  as  His  attendants.  But  if  the  original 
meaning  has  been  changed,  it  was  done  by  the 
Greek  translators,  not  by  the  author  of  "  To  the 
Hebrews."  The  lesson  he  finds  in  the  words  is 
that  the  angels,  instead  of  being  eternal  and  un- 
changeable like  the  Son,  are  evanescent  and  change 
their  form. 

i.  8,  9 
With  this  he  contrasts  a  quotation  from  Psalm  xlv. 
This  psalm  was  originally  written  in  honour  of  the 
marriage  of  some  king,  possibly  an  Israelitish  king. 
It  owed  its  place  in  the  Canon  to  the  fact  that  it 
had  been  interpreted  Messianically.  This  writer 
adopts  this  interpretation  and  finds  the  psalm  in 
several  ways  suitable  for  his  purpose.  The  righteous 
rule  of  the  king,  and  his  anointing  with  the  oil  of 
gladness  typified  for  him  the  Christ,  the  Anointed, 
the  Righteous,  with  His  message  of  Good  News. 
But  the  quotation  has  two  special  attractions  for 
him.  It  records  the  permanence  of  the  Messiah's 
dominion,  which  we  now  see  over  against  the 
facility  with  which  the  angels  who  have  no  thrones 
are  reduced  to  the  shadow  of  a  shade.  In  the 
last  line  the  bridegroom  king  is  described  as  happier 
than  all  his  fellows  (i.e.  all  the  contemporary  princes). 
The  writer  interprets  this  allegorically  :  The  Messiah 
is  blessed  above  all  possible  rivals,  especially  the 
angels. 

49  d 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

i.    10-12 

One  more  Scripture  quotation  helps  out  the  argu- 
ment. At  the  end  of  Psalm  cii.  God  is  addressed 
as  the  maker  of  heaven  and  earth,  and  He  who 
changes  not  is  contrasted  with  the  swiftness  and 
completeness  of  the  destruction  that  will  one  day 
be  theirs.  The  word  "  Lord  "  which  has  some- 
how become  inserted  in  the  first  line  of  the  Greek 
version  of  the  psalm  gives  this  writer,  doubtless 
following  a  current  tradition,  the  opportunity  of 
representing  the  Messiah  as  the  creator  who 
remains  unmoved  and  immovable  amid  the  ruins 
of  the  universe. 

i.  13 

It  is  characteristic  of  the  author  that  he  keeps 
till  the  last  the  quotation  which  must  have  been 
in  his  mind  all  the  time,  from  Psalm  ex.,  a  psalm  on 
whose  significance  Jesus  had  pondered  and  invited 
others  to  ponder,  a  psalm  which  plays  a  prominent 
part  in  the  New  Testament  and  especially  in  this 
epistle.  In  the  original  psalm  a  priest  king  of  the 
Jews  is  invited  to  sit  beside  God  as  His  deputy. 
The  author  of  "  To  the  Hebrews  "  finds  in  it  the 
assurance  that  after  His  ascension  the  great  high 
priest  will  share  the  throne  of  God,  an  honour 
promised  to  no  angel. 

If  all  this  seems  to  the  modern  reader  uninter- 
esting and  unprofitable,  yet  some  drudgery  of  the 
kind  must  be  undertaken  if  we  are  to  get  the 
author's  point  of  view,  with  reference  for  example 

5° 


More   Than  a   Ministering   Spirit 

to  the  nature  and  interpretation  of  Scripture,  the 
meaning  of  prophecy  and  the  position  of  Jesus  in 
the  scheme  of  things.  By  a  road  that  seems  to 
us  tortuous  he  has  reached  his  goal,  namely 
Scripture  support  for  his  conviction  that  Jesus 
is  God's  Son  as  no  other  is  God's  Son  ;  that 
He  reigns,  reigns  in  righteousness,  and  reigns  alone 
with  God  ;  the  same  for  ever,  unchanging  and 
unchangeable. 

i.  14 

The  writer  concludes  with  a  curious  depreciatory 
criticism  of  the  angels.  They  are  only  ministering 
spirits,  they  go  where  they  are  sent,  their  mission 
is  to  serve,  to  serve  the  future  heirs  of  salvation. 
Has  he  forgotten  that  his  great  high  priest  came 
not  to  be  ministered  unto  but  to  minister  ? 


5i 


CHAPTER   VI 

THE    MYSTERY    OF    PAIN    AND    DEATH 
(ii.   1-4) 

The  beginning  of  the  second  chapter  clarifies  the 
situation.  It  shows  us  that  even  in  the  "  proof- 
text  "  section  of  chapter  i.  what  we  have  is  not 
a  scholastic  theologian  trying  to  score  points,  but 
a  preacher,  striving  with  the  weapons  with  which 
he  was  familiar,  by  methods  moreover  which  must 
have  carried  conviction  to  his  readers,  to  uphold 
the  crown  rights  of  His  Lord,  and  to  save  his 
people  from  the  destruction  that  he  saw  impending. 
In  this  next  section  too  it  is  the  pastor  who  speaks, 
the  shepherd  whose  heart  is  sore  and  anxious  for 
the  sheep  who  are  no  longer  content  with  the 
safety  of  the  old  sheep-fold. 

ii.  i,  2 

"  That  is  why,"  he  begins.  The  complicated 
proof-text  argument  has  been  leading  up  to  a  very 
practical  point.  They  are  in  danger  of  drifting 
away  from  their  moorings  and  he  would  deliver 
them.  In  vi.  19  again  he  thinks  of  the  Christian 
hope  as  an  anchor  that  holds.  We  are  familiar 
in  modern  times  with  warnings  not  to  drift  away 

52 


The   Mystery   of  Pain   and   Death 

from  the  old  moorings.  Our  experience  inclines 
us  to  associate  these  admonitions  with  obscurantist 
attempts  to  block  the  progress  of  Christian  thought. 
Men  who  are  afraid  of  new  ideas  cannot  appeal  for 
support  to  the  author  of  this  epistle.  What  they 
mean  is  that  the  Christian  mind  should  remain 
stationary  while  the  stream  of  thought  flows  by. 
His  meaning  is  that  the  Christian  soul  should 
remain  anchored  while  the  stream  of  temptation 
flows  by.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  safeguard  against 
temptation  he  is  about  to  propose  is  that  they 
should  advance  to  new  and  higher  thoughts  of 
Jesus,  that  they  should  no  longer  be  content  with 
the  old  formulae,  but  should  get  a  firmer  hold  on 
the  Christian  faith  by  getting  a  vision  of  Jesus  at  a 
new  angle. 

The  Old  Testament  Law,  in  giving  which, 
according  to  Jewish  tradition,  angels  were  God's 
mouthpiece,  was  nevertheless  a  valid  Law.  Men 
disobeyed  it  at  their  peril.  Disobedience  was 
sometimes  punished  by  God  Himself,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  wilderness  generation  ;  even  when 
inflicted  by  God's  human  representatives  it  had 
divine  sanction  and  was  in  fact  God's  punishment. 
God's  new  revelation  has  been  given  not  through 
angels  but  through  the  Lord  Himself.  God  is 
not  mocked.  We  can  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  it  if  we 
will,  but  the  consequences  will  be  more  terrible 
than  for  those  who  infringed  the  ordinances  of  the 
older  imperfect  revelation. 

53 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

This  preacher  then  is  a  prophet,  a  man  after 
the  heart  of  Thomas  Carlyle,  who  is  convinced  that 
we  are  living  in  a  serious  world,  where  if  we  choose 
we  may  live  frivolously  and  foolishly,  but  in  the 
end  life  pays  back. 

Nor  is  this  just  a  passing  mood  of  one,  who  on 
the  whole  thinks  nothing  matters  very  much.  It 
is  the  fixed  conviction  of  a  stern  prophet  of  God  ; 
his  reading  of  Scripture  and  his  reading  of  life. 
He  utters  such  warnings  repeatedly,  and  towards 
the  end  of  the  letter  he  tells  his  readers  again  : 
"  If  there  was  no  way  of  escape  for  them  who 
refused  the  warning  message  spoken  on  earth,  how 
much  less  will  there  be  for  us  if  we  turn  our  backs 
on  Him  who  warns  from  heaven  !  "  (xii.  25).  Does 
not  the  absence  of  this  note  from  our  preaching 
account  for  much  of  its  ineffectiveness  ?  We  have 
dismissed  hell  from  our  thoughts.  We  have 
explained  that  all  the  imagery  connected  with  the 
word  is  only  imagery,  and  have  tacitly  inferred  that 
therefore  the  thing  has  no  significance. 

What  is  the  fate  in  store  for  those  who  refuse 
to  listen  to  the  Divine  word  spoken  through  Jesus  ? 
The  writer  does  not  tell  us.  Twice  in  four  verses 
he  speaks  of  salvation  (i.  14,  ii.  3).  What  does  he 
mean  by  salvation  ?  He  does  not  tell  us.  But 
he  knows  that  to  have  what  Jesus  can  give  us  is 
to  be  saved,  to  refuse  to  have  it  is  to  be  lost,  and 
that  between  these  two  there  is  a  great  gulf  fixed. 
It   reminds    us    of  the    concluding   words    of  the 

54 


The   Mystery  of  Pain  and  Death 

parable  of  the  prodigal.  To  be  away  from  the 
home,  living  the  self-centred  life,  is  to  be  lost.  To 
be  with  the  father,  with  whatever  shamefacedness 
we  return,  is  to  be  found.  The  difference  between 
the  most  inglorious  return  and  the  failure  to  return 
is  such  that  all  men  of  good  will  must  make  merry 
and  be  glad,  though  the  wanderer  creep  home  in 
rags. 

ii.  3 

The  writer  would  convince  his  readers  of  the 
genuineness  of  the  Gospel  message.  He  has  four 
proofs.  Are  they  very  different  from  the  proofs 
by  which  we  convince  ourselves  ?  First,  the 
original  message  came  from  God,  speaking  through 
the  Lord,  speaking  not  only  through  His  teaching 
but  through  His  whole  life  and  His  death.  God 
revealing  Himself  in  and  through  Jesus  is  the  basis 
of  the  Christian  Gospel.  But  in  the  second  place, 
comparatively  few  people  heard  Jesus.  Most  people 
in  His  own  day,  and  all  in  later  days,  had  to  depend 
on  human  agency  for  the  transmission  of  the 
message.  Yet  this  writer  is  convinced  that,  to 
the  best  of  their  ability,  they  handed  on  the  message 
intact.  If  the  Church  leaders  of  the  first  and 
second  generations  completely  transformed  the 
Gospel  of  Jesus,  as  we  are  so  often  told  that  they 
did,  at  least  they  were  quite  unconscious  of  doing 
so  ;  nor  so  far  as  we  have  any  record  had  any  of 
the  immediate  followers  of  Jesus  any  consciousness 
that  this  was  happening.     Further,  while  it  would 

55 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

be  foolish  to  pretend  that  the  story  of  Jesus' 
ministry  is  told  in  the  New  Testament  entirely  in 
what  we  now  know  as  the  scientific  spirit,  yet  we 
note  the  importance  attached  by  Luke,  in  the 
Introduction  to  his  Gospel,  to  the  testimony  of 
eye-witnesses,  and  by  this  writer  to  the  testimony 
of  ear-witnesses. 

ii.  4 

In  the  third  place,  when  the  message  was  pro- 
claimed, God  added  His  testimony  ;  signs  and 
marvels  and  manifold  exhibitions  of  His  power. 
Fourthly,  in  His  own  inexplicable  but  reasonable 
way,  God  followed  the  preached  word  with  the 
equipment  of  spiritual  gifts  ;  to  each  his  own 
appropriate  spiritual  gifts,  since  no  man  can  mono- 
polise the  Spirit.  But  whatever  their  spiritual 
endowment,  those  who  heard  and  received  the 
message  were  manifestly  new  men,  with  an  effective- 
ness they  had  never  had  before. 

(ii.  5-18) 

ii.  5 

The  writer  then  comes  to  closer  grips  with 
his  subject  ;  but  first,  in  a  parenthetic  clause, 
he  gives  us  a  revealing  glimpse  into  his  purpose  : 
"  the  world  to  come,  which  is  my  subject."  A 
superficial  reading  of  the  epistle  might  leave  us 
with  the  impression  that  his  main  subject  is 
the  Melchizedec  high-priesthood  of  Jesus.  It  is 
the  leading  subject  in  the  sense  that  it  occupies  the 

56 


The   Mystery  of  Pain  and  Death 

central  place  in  his  argument  and  that  his  thoughts 
pivot  round  it  ;  but  looking  deeper  we  see  that 
his  real  subject  is,  as  he  himself  says  it  is,  the 
future  world  ;  or,  to  put  it  in  his  own  phraseology, 
the  world  of  eternal,  unseen  realities.  He  wants 
to  lead  his  readers  from  the  shadow  to  the  substance, 
to  deliver  them  from  bondage  to  the  cramped  life 
that  is  bounded  by  the  seen  and  temporal,  to  bring 
them  into  a  large  place  and  let  them  breathe  the 
free  air  of  God's  real  world.  His  ambition  for 
them  is  that  they  should  be  men  of  faith  who  can 
pierce  through  the  shadows  of  sense  to  the  truth, 
through  the  mists  to  the  certain  future  that  they 
hide. 

He  has  been  speaking  of  angels.  Perhaps  now 
there  is  a  certain  half-conscious  impatience  with 
the  whole  scheme  of  thought  in  which  these  in- 
tangible beings  played  so  large  a  part.  In  any 
case  the  dominion  of  the  angels,  if  they  had  any, 
is  in  the  past  :  their  day  is  done  ;  the  future  is 
with  man.  There  is  a  fine  Christian  optimism  in 
this  section.  Man's  ultimate  triumph  is  assured  ; 
God  is  bringing  many  sons  into  glory.  But 
questions  arose  then  as  they  arise  now.  If  the 
coming  of  Jesus  divided  the  world  into  two  eras, 
if  the  powers  of  the  Messianic  age  are  at  work  in 
the  world,  why  is  there  not  clearer  evidence  of  it  ? 
To  some  it  seems  questionable  even  in  our  day 
whether  on  the  whole  we  are  making  progress. 

Apparently  to  the  first  readers  of  "  Hebrews  " 

57 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

it  was  more  than  a  speculative  question.  As  we  see 
from  chapter  ii.,  they  were  still  face  to  face  with 
the  great  human  enemies  :  temptation,  suffering, 
sin,  fear,  and  death.  Their  religious  faith  was 
being  shaken.  The  writer  reminds  them  of  Him 
who  won  the  victory  for  them  by  sharing  their 
experiences  and  fighting  their  battles.  But  this 
only  pushes  the  question  one  stage  farther  back. 
Why  had  the  Christ  to  suffer  the  pain,  the  humilia- 
tion, of  the  Cross,  of  an  agonising  death,  of  apparent 
defeat  ? 

Here  again  it  is  easy,  or  we  think  it  easy,  for 
us  with  whom  for  nearly  two  millennia  the  Cross 
has  been  the  symbol  of  all  we  hold  noblest  and 
dearest,  to  understand  why  Christ  should  die  on 
the  Cross.  Our  crosses  are  dainty,  shining  things 
of  precious  metal  ;  we  wear  them  as  ornaments. 
But  the  men  of  that  day  were  near  enough  the 
beginning  of  things  to  be  able  to  picture,  if  they 
had  not  seen,  the  hideous  reality,  the  scene  on 
Calvary,  when,  by  a  decision  of  the  "  impartial  " 
Roman  authority,  amid  the  jeers  and  triumphant 
laughter  of  the  leaders  of  His  own  people,  Jesus 
had  been  tortured  to  the  death  that  was  the  most 
shameful  as  well  as  the  most  painful  of  all.  And 
this  was  the  Jesus  they  were  asked  to  accept  as 
God's  last  word  to  mankind.  Not  only  so  ;  but 
they  themselves  had  had  some  taste  of  what  their 
Master  had  suffered,  and  it  was  no  bright  outlook 
they  still  faced. 

58 


The  Mystery  of  Pain  and   Death 

ii.  6-8. 

For  guidance  the  author  turns  to  a  psalm,  the 
eighth,  and,  as  before,  he  interprets  the  psalm  in 
his  own  way.  The  psalmist,  contrasting  the  insig- 
nificance of  man  with  the  wonders  of  the  heavens, 
gives  thanks  to  God  for  the  lofty  place  which  God 
has  nevertheless  assigned  to  man.  In  the  usual 
way  of  Hebrew  poets  the  psalmist  expresses  the 
glory  of  man  in  two  parallel  sentences  :  "  Thou 
hast  made  him  but  little  lower  than  the  angels  "  (in 
the  Hebrew  :  "  little  less  than  divine ")  :  "  with 
glory  and  honour  hast  thou  crowned  him."  The 
writer  understands  the  first  clause  (which  he  found 
in  his  Greek  Bible)  to  mean  :  Thou  hast  put  man 
for  a  little  while  in  subjection  to  the  angels.  Thus 
he  finds  in  the  psalm  three  inspired  statements 
about  God's  destiny  for  man.  "  God  has  for  a  time 
subjected  him  to  the  control  of  angels  "  (in  the 
11  former  age  ").  "  God  has  crowned  him  with 
glory  and  honour.  God  has  put  all  things  under 
his  feet."  On  his  interpretation  of  Scripture  the 
first  of  these  three  utterances  is  a  statement  of 
fact  ;  the  second  and  third  are  prophecies.  They 
are  however  prophecies  which  are  as  yet  obviously 
unfulfilled. 

ii.  9 

Though  they  have  not  been  fulfilled  in  the  case 
of  men  in  general,  the  first  of  the  two  has  been 
in  the  case  of  one  man,  the  Man  Jesus.  He  has 
been    crowned   with   glory   and   honour.     He   has 

59 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

sat  down  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty  on 
High,  having  for  ever  opened  for  us  the  way  to 
God.  The  Jesus  who  has  done  this  was  one  of  us. 
In  a  very  real  sense  it  is  man  that  has  been  crowned 
with  glory  and  honour.  The  life  of  Jesus  and  His 
final  triumph  have  given  an  uplift  to  the  whole 
human  race,  revealing  in  us  unsuspected  potentiali- 
ties, calling  us  to  achievements  hitherto  impossible. 
This  again  is  no  mere  fanciful  speculation.  With 
the  history  of  the  Church  behind  us,  we  know  it  is  a 
correct  interpretation  of  what  Jesus  has  done  for  us. 

If  the  first  prophecy  has  been  fulfilled,  if  man  in 
the  person  of  Christ  has  been  crowned  with  glory 
and  honour,  the  second  will  with  equal  certainty 
be  fulfilled  :  God  will  put  all  things  under  His 
feet.  Man's  final  triumph  is  assured.  The  writer 
here  is  trying  to  comfort  and  fill  with  new  courage 
men  whose  religious  faith  is  waning  through  what 
they  have  to  suffer.  To  get  a  message  for  them 
he  turns  to  a  text  of  Scripture.  Really  what  he 
has  to  tell  them  is  that  Jesus  has  suffered  and  Jesus 
has  triumphed.  What  He  did,  He  did  for  us.  In 
His  triumph  we  too  shall  triumph. 

But  this  still  leaves  unanswered  the  question  : 
Why  had  Jesus  to  suffer  ?  To  understand  the 
earnestness  with  which  this  question  was  asked 
we  have  to  remember  the  attitude  to  suffering  of 
the  non-Christian  world.  Hinduism  and  Buddhism 
are  both  in  large  measure  attempts  to  solve  the 
problem  of  pain.     The  doctrine  of  transmigration 

60 


The   Mystery  of   Pain  and   Death 

is  the  Hindu  solution  :  suffering  is  the  punishment 
of  sin,  of  sin  committed  in  a  previous  existence. 
Buddhism  makes  a  further  contribution  :  be  kindly 
towards  all  sufferers  in  a  world  where  there  is  no 
God.  The  Jews  seemed  largely  to  have  forgotten 
the  wonderful  conception  of  God's  Suffering  Ser- 
vant ;  or,  to  speak  more  correctly,  it  had  hardly 
dawned  on  them  that  the  vicarious  Sufferer  whose 
stripes  brought  healing  to  others  might  be  the 
Messiah  Himself.  They  clung  to  their  picture 
of  the  victorious  Messiah  who  would  reign  till  He 
had  put  all  things  under  His  feet.  Mahommedans 
found  the  story  of  a  crucified  Jesus  so  repugnant  that 
they  refused  to  give  it  a  place  in  their  sacred  book. 
It  has  been  said  that  the  Christian  is  the  only 
man  who  is  ashamed  of  his  religion.  It  is  not 
quite  true  :  the  educated  Hindu  is  ashamed,  if 
not  of  his  religion,  at  least  of  many  of  the  beliefs 
and  practices  of  his  religion.  But  in  so  far  as  the 
element  of  shame  does  enter  into  the  profession 
of  Christianity,  and  none  can  deny  that  it  does 
enter  very  largely,  is  it  not  due  in  large  measure 
to  the  feeling  that  the  Cross,  representing  as  it  does 
self-abnegation,  is  no  fit  symbol  for  the  red-blooded 
descendants  of  long  lines  of  fighting  ancestors, 
whose  glory  it  has  been  to  triumph  over  others  ? 

ii.  i off. 

The  writer  now  wrestles  with  this  problem.      In 
one  of  those  memorable  phrases  he  strikes  out  for 

61 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

us,  he  calls  Jesus  the  Captain  of  our  Salvation. 
To  this  function  He  was  appointed  by  God  who 
was  the  creator  as  He  is  the  goal  of  all  that  is. 
(Incidentally  we  are  reminded  of  the  danger  of 
building  systems  of  dogmatic  theology  on  this 
writer's  phrases.  In  i.  2  the  world  was  made 
through  Jesus,  in  ii.  10  through  God.)  It  was  in  ac- 
cordance with  God's  character  that  He  should  equip 
thoroughly  for  His  work  the  Captain  of  our  Salvation. 
That  equipment  involved  a  baptism  of  suffering. 

Why  should  this  be  so  ?  He  does  not,  as  we 
might  expect  he  would,  quote  one  of  the  words 
of  Jesus  in  which  He  tried  to  revolutionise  the 
current  conception  of  the  victorious  Messiah,  in 
which  He  dealt  with  the  mystery  and  the  redemp- 
tive value  of  suffering.  Nor  does  he  turn  to 
Isaiah  liii.  He  takes  a  line  of  his  own.  The 
passage  is  suffused  nevertheless  with  the  teaching 
of  the  Suffering  Servant  passages,  and  of  Jesus  on 
the  meaning  of  suffering.  "  It  was  in  accordance 
with  the  nature  of  God,  who  is  at  once  the  author 
and  the  interpretation  of  the  universe,  to  equip  by 
suffering  the  Captain  of  man's  salvation."  One 
reason  is  that  men  have  to  suffer  and  He  who  would 
save  them  must  share  their  sufferings.  If  we 
would  save  the  "  slum  "  dwellers  we  must  live  the 
"  slum  "  life.  We  might  "  save  the  heathen  "  by 
sending  them  suitable  literature,  but  we  can  do 
it  more  effectively  by  living  among  them  and,  as 
far  as  may  be,  sharing  their  life. 

62 


The  Mystery  of  Pain  and  Death 

We  are  for  ever  grateful  to  the  writer  of  this 
epistle  for  insisting  as  he  does  that  Jesus  became 
one  of  us.  So  often  the  New  Testament  writers 
(we  see  the  tendency  at  work  even  in  the  Gospels) 
thought  they  were  honouring  Jesus  by  removing 
Him  from  us  as  far  as  possible,  till  sometimes  He 
hardly  seems  to  have  anything  in  common  with 
ourselves.  This  writer  gives  Jesus  a  place  in  the 
heavens  as  lofty  as  any  New  Testament  writer  gives 
Him,  but  he  will  not  let  us  forget  that  He  is 
nevertheless  one  of  ourselves.  Those  who  tell  us 
that  the  truth  we  have  to  contend  for  is  not  the 
divinity  of  Jesus  but  the  divinity  of  man,  if  they 
are  not  always  very  intelligible  or  very  helpful,  do 
seem  to  get  some  support  from  this  chapter.  "  He 
who  consecrates  and  they  who  are  consecrated 
have  one  common  Father."  Jesus  and  His  fol- 
lowers are  children  of  one  Father  (almost  suggesting 
they  had  been  brothers  in  eternity). 

The  Jesus  of  this  section  is  the  Jesus  of  the 
Synoptic  Gospels  ;  the  sympathetic,  helpful,  pity- 
ing friend,  the  never-failing,  leal-hearted  brother. 
We  have  to  live  our  lives  with  bodies  of  flesh  and 
blood.  These  are  the  sources  of  our  temptations, 
the  seat  of  our  sufferings  ;  these  contain  the  seeds 
of  our  decay.  Since  Jesus  was  our  brother  and 
was  to  be  our  deliverer,  He  too  wore  a  human 
body,  with  its  capacity  for  temptation  and  suffering 
and  its  certainty  of  death. 

Yet  even  in  the  earliest  strata  of  the  Synoptic 

63 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

Gospels  there  is  no  trace  of  any  period  when  Jesus 
was  just  a  greater  one  among  the  others.  He  was 
always  The  one.  This  writer  suggests  the  same 
when  he  tells  us  that  Jesus  was  not  ashamed  to 
call  them  brothers,  just  as  he  tells  us  later  that 
God  was  not  ashamed  to  be  called  the  God  of  the 
patriarchs  (xi.  16)  so  long  as  they  chose  the  painful 
path  of  faith.  The  Son  of  Man  is  sometimes 
ashamed  of  His  brothers,  not  because  they  are 
His  brothers,  but  because  they  are  ashamed  of 
Him  and  shrink  from  the  hard  choice  He  puts 
before  them  (Mark  viii.  34f.). 

How  does  this  writer  know  that  Jesus  was 
"  brother  "  of  the  human  race  ?  We  expect  him 
to  point  to  the  fact  that  He  called  God  Father,  as 
He  taught  His  disciples  to  call  God  Father  ;  or 
to  quote  :  "  Whoever  does  God's  will,  he  is  my 
brother  and  sister  and  mother  "  (Mark  iii.  2S)  '•> 
or  to  refer  to  the  words  of  the  risen  Christ  :  "Go 
tell  my  brothers  to  go  off  to  Galilee  and  there  shall 
they  see  me  "  (Matt,  xxviii.  10).  He  was  evidently 
debarred  by  the  theological  prepossessions  of  the 
day  from  clinching  his  argument  in  this  effective 
way. 

Instead  of  this  he  puts  as  usual  far-fetched 
constructions  on  certain  Old  Testament  passages. 
The  first  twenty-one  verses  of  Psalm  xxii.  are  a 
despairing  cry  for  help.  In  the  agony  of  the  Cross 
Jesus  had  echoed  its  opening  words  :  "  My  God, 
my    God,   why    hast   thou    forsaken    me  ? "      His 

64 


The   Mystery   of   Pain   and   Death 

enemies  had  used  verse  8  as  a  taunt  song  :  "He 
trusted  in  the  Lord  ;  let  Him  deliver  him  ;  let 
Him  save  him,  since  He  delights  in  him  "  (quoted 
as  in  the  Greek  version).  The  early  Church 
regarded  the  psalm  as  Messianic. 

In  verse  22,  which  may  have  been  originally  the 
beginning  of  another  psalm,  and  where  in  any 
case  the  tone  changes  to  one  of  triumphant  thanks- 
giving for  answered  prayer,  the  psalmist  sang  : 
"  I  will  declare  thy  name  to  my  brothers.  In  the 
midst  of  the  congregation  I  will  sing  thy  praise." 
The  author  of  "  Hebrews  "  finds  in  these  words 
the  Messiah  joining  with  His  fellow-worshippers, 
whom  He  calls  His  brothers,  as  a  member  of  the 
congregation,  in  thanks  to  God  for  a  great  deliver- 
ance (ii.  12).  The  fact  that  at  the  end  of  the  psalm 
even  the  heathen  to  the  ends  of  the  earth  are  repre- 
sented as  being  moved  by  the  story  of  God's 
marvellous  grace  to  Israel,  was  no  doubt  one  of 
the  attractions  for  him  of  this  interpretation. 

He  finds  Messiah's  brotherhood  with  man  not 
only  in  the  "  Psalms  "  but  in  "  Isaiah."  In  patient 
hope  Isaiah  had  said  (viii.  1 7^.),  "And  I  will  put  my 
trust  in  Him  (God).  Behold  I  and  the  children 
whom  God  has  given  me.  And  they  shall  be  signs 
and  wonders  in  the  house  of  Israel  from  the  Lord 
of  Hosts  who  dwells  in  Mount  Zion  "  (quoted  as 
in  Greek  version)  ;  that  is,  "  my  name  "  (Jehovah 
saves)  "  and  the  symbolic  names  I  have  given  my 
children   are  living  sermons,   incarnate   pledges  of 

65  E 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

the  future."  "  He  could  not  look  on  them  without 
thinking  of  the  future  and  of  God."  I  The  writer, 
for  some  reason  unknown  to  us,  separates  the  two 
quotations  though  in  "  Isaiah  "  the  one  follows  imme- 
diately on  the  other,  cuts  the  second  off  sharp  in 
the  middle,  and  represents  the  whole  as  spoken  by 
Messiah.  He  thus  makes  the  points  :  first,  that 
Messiah  trusts  God  like  one  of  ourselves  ;  and 
second,  that  we  as  God's  children,  given  to  the 
Messiah,  are  in  some  sense  His  brothers.  In  all 
this,  of  course,  we  have  to  remember  that,  by 
methods  satisfactory  to  his  readers,  he  is  proving 
a  point  of  which  he  is  already  convinced  by  quite 
other  arguments. 

If  Jesus  was  to  do  for  us  all  that  we  need,  one 
particular  enemy  He  had  to  face  was  death.  The 
fear  of  death  is  universal  ;  courage  can  rise  no 
higher  than  to  face  death  fearlessly  ;  self-sacrifice 
can  go  no  farther  than  to  lay  down  one's  life  for 
one's  friends.  But  the  Jewish  fear  of  death  was 
something  other  and  deeper  than  the  universal, 
largely  physical  dread  of  it.  It  was  a  religious 
fear  which  it  is  difficult  for  us  fully  to  understand. 
The  stories  in  the  second  and  third  chapters  of 
Genesis  which  suggested  that  death  was  the  penalty 
of  disobedience  to  God  were  doubtless  partly  the 
cause  and  partly  the  effect  of  the  feeling. 

The  earlier  Hebrew  belief  that  death  meant  not 

1  Quoted  from  "  Isaiah,"  by  J.  E.  McFadyen,  in  Bible  for  Home 
and  School  Series. 

66 


The   Mystery   of   Pain   and   Death 

only  the  loss  of  all  on  earth  that  men  hold  dear 
but  the  end  of  communion  with  God,  would 
intensify  the  natural  shrinking  from  death  ;  while 
another  factor  at  work  was  the  increasing  con- 
viction with  which  in  later  Judaism  the  creed  was 
held  :  After  death,  the  judgment.  Satan  too 
tempts  to  sin  which  leads  to  death.  Death  indeed 
was  regarded  as  peculiarly  the  domain  of  Satan, 
who  was  even  believed  to  have  some  power  of 
inflicting  death  ;  for  in  I  Corinthians  v.  5  Paul  con- 
signs to  Satan  "  for  the  destruction  of  his  flesh  "  the 
man  who  was  guilty  of  incest,  "  that  his  spirit 
might  be  saved  in  the  day  of  the  Lord  "  ;  evidently 
meaning  that  he  wished  the  man's  body  to  die  for 
the  salvation  of  his  soul. 

All  this  would  give  the  thought  of  death  a 
repulsiveness  beyond  even  that  which  we  know. 
With  Paul  too  the  last  enemy  to  be  destroyed  is 
death  (1  Cor.  xv.  26).  These  facts  light  up  for 
us  the  part  which  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  played 
in  the  thought  and  life  of  His  first  followers,  help 
us  to  understand  the  triumph  with  which  Paul 
sang  :  "  O  death,  where  is  thy  victory  ?  O  death, 
where  is  thy  sting  ?  "  (1  Cor.  xv.  55). 

ii.   I4ff. 

Jesus,  says  the  author,  by  sharing  our  human 
frame,  by  dying  our  death,  was  able  to  overthrow 
the  devil  in  his  very  stronghold,  and  so  to  free 
from  slavery  those  who  were  under  a  lifelong  fear 

67 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

of  death.  It  was  not  angels  that  Jesus  came  to 
help,  but  Abraham's  seed,  the  company  of  the 
faithful,  men  of  flesh  and  blood.  Angels  may 
have  their  problems  ;  but  these  bodyless  creatures 
are  not  subject  to  the  passions  and  temptations, 
have  not  to  face  the  suffering  and  death,  that  are 
the  lot  of  men.  It  was  into  this  suffering,  striving, 
dying  human  world  that  Jesus  entered.  Then,  by 
an  artifice  of  which  he  is  fond,  the  author  gives 
a  hint,  as  yet  only  a  hint,  of  the  subject  which  fills 
his  mind.  This  Jesus  is  our  high  priest,  trusty 
and  full  of  pity,  winning  from  God  forgiveness  for 
our  sins.  It  was  because  He  was  to  be  our  high 
priest  that  He  had  to  share  our  nature  at  all  points. 
He  suffered  by  His  temptations,  as  we  suffer  by 
ours,  and  so  He  can  help  us  in  our  need. 

Thus  at  the  end  of  the  road,  an  unnecessarily 
winding  road  as  it  may  seem  to  us,  and  one  that 
has  taken  us  by  some  very  unfamiliar  scenery,  we 
begin  to  see  whither  we  have  arrived.  The  author 
has  given  us  his  version  of  the  modern  "  struggling 
God."  All  that  the  readers  have  to  say  about 
their  hard  lot,  the  sufferings  they  have  endured 
and  that  still  face  them,  is  true.  He  does  not 
minimise  the  sufferings.  It  is  true  too  that  God 
seems  to  hold  His  hand  and  make  no  sign.  He  can 
understand  how  they  are  "  tempted  "  to  give  up 
their  faith,  which  seems  to  have  no  foundation  in 
fact. 

"  But  look  at  the  other  side,"  he  says.     Suffering 

68 


The   Mystery   of  Pain   and   Death 

is  not  the  enemy  you  think  it  is.  It  does  not 
necessarily  mean  that  God  is  angry,  still  less  that 
God  is  forgetful.  The  humiliation  must  come,  it 
is  God's  way  ;  but  it  brings  discipline,  it  has 
redeeming  power.  Suffering  has  its  roots  deep  in 
the  heart  of  God.  Nor  does  God  stand  outside 
it  all.  He  has  given  us  Jesus,  who  is  the  exalted 
Christ  but  is  nevertheless  one  of  ourselves,  our 
brother.  Because  Jesus  has  lived  our  life,  our 
triumph  is  sure.  He  has  been  crowned  with  glory 
and  honour,  and  we  shall  be  crowned  with  glory 
and  honour.  Jesus  suffered  as  we  suffer,  was 
tempted  to  give  up  His  faith  in  God  as  we  are 
tempted  to  give  up  our  faith.  He  met  and  con- 
quered Satan  in  his  very  throne,  in  death  itself. 
We  can  take  fresh  courage  then.  Our  high  priest 
has  not  only  opened  for  us  the  way  to  God,  but 
at  every  step  of  the  way  His  understanding  com- 
passion and  help  are  freely  ours. 


68 


CHAPTER    VII 

THE    SABBATH    REST    OF    GOD 
(ill  i-iv.  13) 

What  advantage  had  the  readers  taken  of  the 
great  gift  that  God  had  given  them  ?  The  author 
is  evidently  afraid  that  the  answer  is  in  some  doubt. 
He  has  in  mind  a  well-known  historic  precedent, 
the  generation  that  came  out  of  Egypt.  They  too 
had  had  a  heaven-sent  leader,  who  should  have 
been  the  Captain  of  their  salvation.  God  had 
done  great  things  for  them  ;  but  on  the  way  they 
were  called  on  to  endure  physical  suffering  ;  they 
were  sometimes  in  straits  from  which  they  saw  no 
escape.  Their  leader  had  remained  loyal,  loyal 
alike  to  God  and  his  people  ;  but  the  faith  of  the 
followers  had  failed,  and  they  never  saw  the 
Promised  Land.  Was  the  tragic  experience  to  be 
repeated  under  far  more  tragic  circumstances  ? 

iii.  iff. 

For  the  first  time  the  readers  are  directly 
addressed,  "  Consecrated  brothers  "  :  brothers  of 
each  other,  of  the  author,  of  Jesus  ;  consecrated, 
called   to   a   new  way  of  life  by  Jesus,   as   he   had 

70 


The   Sabbath  Rest  of  God 

already  reminded  them  (ii.  n).  He  has  already 
said  that  his  subject  is  the  world  to  come  :  the 
other,  the  unseen,  the  higher  life.  They  share,  he 
tells  them  now,  a  heavenly  calling.  They  have 
heard  God's  voice,  God's  call  to  them  to  rise  above 
the  things  on  which  other  men  set  their  hearts  ; 
to  have  a  new  scale  of  values,  to  see  the  old  joys 
and  sorrows  in  their  relative  unimportance  and 
have  higher  and  purer  emotions. 

Jesus  was  fond  of  telling  people  to  use  their 
minds.  "  Study  the  ravens,"  He  had  said  ;  "  study 
the  lilies."  This  writer  uses  the  same  word  now 
with  effect.  "  Since  God  has  given  you  this 
captain,  brother  and  priest,  equipped  at  all  points 
to  help,  study  Him."  Moses  in  his  day  was  an 
apostle,  an  ambassador  sent  by  God.  He  had  also 
performed  the  priestly  functions  till  he  delegated 
them  to  Aaron.  In  the  darkest  hours  Moses  had 
been  loyal  to  his  trust.  "  Study  Jesus,  the  apostle 
and  high  priest  of  our  confession."  (This  phrase 
possibly  but  not  certainly  suggests  that  the  readers 
were  already  familiar  with  the  title  of  high  priest 
as  applied  to  Jesus.) 

The  reference  to  Moses'  faithfulness  is  based 
on  the  story  of  God's  rebuke  to  Miriam  and 
Aaron  when  they  were  jealous  of  Moses  (Num.  xii. 
6-8).  "In  all  my  house  he  is  faithful.  Mouth 
to  mouth  will  I  speak  to  him,"  not  in  dreams  and 
visions  as  God  speaks  to  the  prophet.  In  other 
words  Moses  was  "  far  ben  "  with  God.     On  the 

7i 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

mount  Moses  had  seen  the  realities  of  which  the 
earthly  tabernacle  and  its  furniture  were  but  shadows 
and  copies  (Ex.  xxv.  40).  On  another  Mount 
long  afterwards  Moses  had  stood  beside  Elijah 
with  Jesus  in  a  vision  that  foreshadowed  to  the 
three  disciples  the  sacrifice  of  the  great  high  priest. 
Yet  the  very  passage  in  which  God  gave  this 
tribute  to  what  Paul  calls  the  evanescent  glory  of 
Moses  (2  Cor.  iii.  7)  suggests  the  greater  glory  of 
Jesus.  The  author  had  been  speaking  of  "  sons." 
But  sons  dwell  in  a  house,  the  father's  home. 
Moses  was  faithful  in  all  God's  house  (Num.  xii.  7). 
Jesus'  thoughts  too  had  centred  much  round 
God's  house,  the  temple  made  with  hands.  Perhaps 
almost  to  the  last  He  had  cherished  the  thought 
of  a  cleaner  and  holier  temple  which  might  be  once 
again  a  place  of  prayer.  In  a  mystic  utterance,  the 
key  to  which  we  have  perhaps  lost,  He  had  said 
that  if  the  temple  were  destroyed,  He  would  build 
another  house  for  God,  a  house  not  made  with 
hands  (Mark  xiv.  58).  One  of  Jesus'  most  memor- 
able sayings,  as  is  true  also  of  the  parable  of  the 
prodigal,  had  centred  round  the  family  metaphor 
(Mark  iii.  34f.).  The  idea  of  Jesus'  followers  as 
the  house  of  God  had  gripped  the  imagination. 
Paul  pictured  the  Church  of  God  as  a  house  whose 
foundation  was  Jesus  Christ,  though  it  was  left  to 
men  to  build  the  superstructure.  The  author  of 
1  Timothy  calls  "  the  Church  of  the  living  God  " 
"  the  house  of  God  "  (iii.  15). 

72 


The   Sabbath   Rest  of  God 

This  great  household  of  faith  had  existed  in  the 
world  long  before  Jesus  had  entered  it,  as  we  are 
to  learn  more  fully  when  the  roll  of  the  heroes  of 
faith  is  called  in  the  eleventh  chapter.  Moses  had 
a  position  of  authority  in  it  as  well  as  Jesus.  But 
whereas  Moses  had  a  charge  in  the  house,  Jesus 
was  a  Son  over  the  house.  Whatever  Moses 
did  He  did  "  according  to  all  that  the  Lord  com- 
manded." But  Jesus  spoke  and  acted  as  one 
M  having  authority."  The  servant  does  not  abide 
in  the  house  for  ever,  the  Son  abides  for  ever 
(John  viii.  35).  We  seem  here  to  get  an  echo  of 
the  challenge  which  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount 
Jesus  flung  out  to  the  sufficiency  of  the  Law.  The 
kind  of  morality  which  expresses  itself  in  a  code, 
whose  watchwords  are  "  Thou  shalt  "  and  "  Thou 
shalt  not  "  can  never  be  the  morality  of  a  kingdom 
which  is  not  of  this  world.  It  does  not  probe 
sufficiently  deep,  nor  trace  the  act  far  enough  back 
into  past  history,  nor  take  account  of  the  struggle 
that  so  often  precedes  the  act.  The  citizen  of  the 
kingdom  has  to  yield  the  homage  of  heart  and  brain 
as  well  as  of  the  will.  Perhaps  also  both  in  this 
contrast  between  the  Son  and  the  servant,  and  in  the 
phrase  "  a  Son  whom  He  made  heir  of  all  things  " 
(i.  2)  there  is  a  reminiscence  of  the  parable  of  the 
wicked  vinedressers. 

iii.  6ff. 

This  then  is  the    household  of   faith    to  which 
author    and    readers    belong.     But    they    do    not 

73 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

automatically  remain  members  of  this  household. 
No  writer  in  the  New  Testament  is  farther  removed 
than  this  from  the  view  sometimes  attributed  to 
Paul  of  a  semi-physical  or  wholly  physical  efficacy 
of  the  sacraments.  To  him  religion  is  the  willing 
surrender  of  willing  men  to  the  living  God,  a 
surrender  not  made  once  for  all,  but  so  made  at 
the  beginning  that  it  becomes  a  perpetual  surrender. 
There  must  have  been  some  reason  in  the  local 
circumstances  why  he  returns  again  and  again  to 
this  point,  that  some  experience  through  which  we 
have  passed  in  bygone  days  can  never  be  a  guar- 
antee of  our  "  salvation."  We  must  cling  to  our 
Christian  faith  with  a  manly,  costly  clinging.  He 
calls  our  religion  "  the  hope,"  by  which  he  means 
our  certainty  of  the  future.  We  hear  the  authentic 
Christian  note  in  the  stress  he  lays  on  the  duty 
of  Christian  optimism,  on  the  need  of  confidence, 
of  being  proud  of  our  faith  rather  than  ashamed 
of  it.  This  word  "  confidence  "  (iii.  6,  the  same 
word  as  is  used  of  Peter  and  John  in  Acts  iv.  13) 
means  what  in  religious  circles  is  sometimes  called 
"  liberty,"  liberty  of  utterance  for  example.  The 
"  Acts  of  the  Apostles,"  especially  its  earlier 
chapters,  testifies  to  the  way  in  which  the  new 
power  at  work  in  the  world  delivered  men  from 
all  the  fears  that  shackle  and  disable  us  :  fear  of 
pain  or  of  poverty,  fear  of  "  big  "  men  or  of 
standing  alone,  fear  of  ridicule,  of  public  opinion, 
fear   of   death    itself.     Jesus    came,    as    the    writer 

74 


The   Sabbath   Rest  of  God 

"  to  the  Hebrews "  says,  to  deliver  men  from 
bondage. 

The  author  now  draws  the  moral  from  the  story 
of  the  desert  generation.  It  was  the  same  story 
that  Paul  used  for  the  same  purpose  in  writing  to 
the  Corinthian  Church  (i  Cor.  x.).  The  special 
temptation  of  the  Corinthian  Christians  was  to 
suppose  that  participation  in  the  sacraments  gave 
an  artificial  immunity  from  the  operation  of  the 
law  that  "  Whatsoever  a  man  sows,  that  shall  he 
also  reap."  This  writer  does  not  explicitly  mention 
the  sacraments,  though  it  does  not  follow  that 
the  real  point  was  different.  He  himself  attached 
great  importance  to  the  silence  of  Scripture,  and 
may  at  times  have  intended  his  own  silence  to  be 
equally  significant  on  points  to  which  his  readers 
held  the  clue.  In  modern  times  the  temptation 
has  often  taken  the  form  of  supposing  that  a  correct 
creed  or  good  standing  in  some  organisation  which 
is  a  specially  favoured  channel  of  grace  is  a  passport 
to  eternal  safety. 

Paul  himself  drew  the  moral  from  the  old  story. 
This  writer,  as  usual,  prefers  to  find  it  drawn  in 
the  Old  Testament.  He  turns  to  Psalm  xcv.,  and 
treats  it  with  his  usual  freedom.  In  this  psalm, 
written  perhaps  at  a  time  of  national  renascence 
as  at  the  end  of  the  exile,  God  is  represented  as 
pleading  with  His  people  not  to  harden  their 
hearts  against  His  love  as  the  desert  generation 
had  done.  The  great  point  the  author  of  "Hebrews  " 

75 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

makes  is  his  interpretation  of  the  word  "  to-day," 
with  which  the  quotation  opens.  Like  Paul  he 
understands  "  to-day  "  to  mean  his  own  day,  not 
the  day  in  which  the  psalm  was  written  ;  a  fallacy 
of  interpretation  which  is  working  havoc  in 
"  apocalyptic  "  circles  in  our  own  time. 

iii.   izff. 

The  preacher,  or  rather  the  pastor,  speaks  again. 
He  is  afraid  of  apostasy,  of  apostasy  in  its  literal 
sense.  To  be  a  Christian  is  to  have  and  to  use 
the  right  of  approach  to  God.  "  Let  us  draw  near 
unto  God  through  Jesus  "  is  the  text  of  the  epistle. 
Apostasy  is  "  standing  apart  from  God,"  from  the 
God  for  whom  he  uses  one  of  his  favourite  phrases 
"  the  living  God  "  (iii.  12  ;  cf.  ix.  14,  xii.  22),  the 
alert  God  who  sees  and  knows  and  does  things  ; 
the  God  who  expects  from  us  no  routine  ceremonies 
or  creed  repeated  by  rote,  but  a  living  religion 
which  taxes  mind  and  heart  and  conscience.  This 
kind  of  apostasy  comes  from  loss  of  faith,  from 
what  he  calls  a  "  bad,  unbelieving  heart  "  (iii.  12). 

In  the  struggle  to  retain  our  faith — and  this 
writer  thinks  of  the  Christian  Faith  as  something 
which  in  an  unsympathetic  and  hostile  world  cannot 
be  retained  without  a  struggle — we  can  all  encourage 
each  other  day  by  day  in  the  fight  that  is  renewed 
day  by  day.  To  the  author  of  this  epistle  this 
work  of  encouragement  is  not  the  peculiar  province 
of  the  apostle  or  of  the  priest  (he  never  mentions 

76 


The   Sabbath   Rest   of   God 

either), Inor  even  of  the  "  leader."  He  thinks  of 
the  Church  as  a  company  of  brothers  who  need 
each  other  and  can  help  each  other  (cf.  x.  24fT.). 
We  can  point  out  to  each  other  the  specious  way 
in  which  sin  deceives  us — the  sin  that  "  hardens 
the  heart,"  that  blinds  us  to  the  vision,  quenches 
enthusiasm,  and  makes  us  commonplace,  easy- 
going members  of  the  Church.  The  particular 
temptation  in  view  seems  to  be  the  tendency  to 
say  that  we  have  taken  far  too  tragic  a  view  of 
religion,  that  multitudes  of  men  whose  religion  is 
just  part  of  their  mental  equipment  and  causes 
them  no  kind  of  annoyance,  live  decent  lives  and 
die  decent  deaths,  that  all  through  the  generations 
thousands  of  Israelites,  for  example,  had  sought 
and  found  God  though  they  had  never  heard  of 
Jesus. 

"  We  have  a  share  in  Christ  "  (just  as  "  we  have 
a  share  in  the  Holy  Spirit"  (vi.  4),  though  Paul's 
doctrine  of  mystical  union  with  Christ  does  not 
appeal  to  this  writer.  To  him  Jesus  is  our  pioneer, 
our  captain  who  goes  on  before).  But  we  retain 
our  confidence  in  Him  only  so  long  as  we  hold 
fast  the  confidence  of  our  first  Christian  experience. 
("  Confidence "  is  the  same  word  as  in  xi.  1  : 
"  Faith  is  our  confidence  in  the  things  we  hope 
for,"  our  standing-ground).  As  long  as  God  uses 
the  word  "  to-day  "  and  continues  to  plead  with 
us,  it  is  always  open  to  us  to  listen  ;  but  so  long 
also  is  there  the  dreadful  possibility  that  even   if 

77 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

we  have  at  one  time  listened  to  God's  message 
under  the  stress  of  persecution  or  of  life's  hard 
experiences  we  may  gradually  close  our  ears. 

In  this  passage  we  hear  the  voice  of  a  teacher 
who  knows  the  peculiar  temptations  of  the  middle 
years  of  life.  Doubtless  he  knew  the  parable  of 
the  sower.  In  any  case  he  was  familiar  with  the 
experience  so  gr?phically  portrayed  in  the  parable, 
the  early  dew  of  morning  that  is  parched  ere  noon. 
We  are  as  familiar  with  the  experience  as  we  are 
with  the  parable  ;  our  very  familiarity  with  it  has 
blinded  us  to  the  pathos  that  Jesus  saw  in  it.  It 
is  not  only  that  tasks  willed  in  hours  of  insight 
have  to  be  fulfilled  in  hours  of  gloom,  but  that  so 
often  they  are  not  fulfilled  at  all. 

There  is  the  first  awakening  to  the  liberating 
message  that  Jesus  brings,  the  first  glad  response 
to  the  high  demands  the  Gospel  makes  on  us. 
Then,  as  time  goes  on,  somehow  the  road  is  rougher 
than  we  thought  it  would  be,  and  we  are  not  quite 
so  sure  it  is  the  road  sensible  men  take.  We 
become  engrossed  in  business  or  anxious  to  have 
a  good  time,  or  it  may  be  that  we  just  follow  the 
crowd,  or  that  the  price  of  following  the  Christ, 
the  price  in  unpopularity  or  loss  or  pain,  is  greater 
than  we  are  quite  prepared  to  pay  ;  and  we  try  to 
persuade  ourselves  that  our  youthful  enthusiasms 
took  insufficient  account  of  the  claims  of  common 
sense.  We  spare  no  pains  to  let  the  young  see 
the  vision  ;    might  we  not  do  more  than  we  do  to 

78 


The   Sabbath   Rest  of  God 

help  the  middle-aged  to  keep  on  seeing  it  ?  One 
of  the  great  New  Testament  virtues  is  "  sticking  to 
it,"  "  holding  out." 

iii.  i6ff. 

In  the  concluding  verses  of  chapter  iii.  the  writer 
draws  his  uncompromising  moral.  He  accepts 
wholeheartedly  the  Gospel  of  forgiveness  and  pity 
and  Divine  help,  but  of  any  belief  in  a  God  who 
is  weakly  indulgent  or  indifferent  to  sin  there  is 
no  trace  in  the  epistle.  In  spite  of  the  great 
deliverance  wrought  by  God  for  the  wilderness 
generation,  for  forty  years  they  provoked  God  to 
continual  anger.  (Some  have  found  in  this  refer- 
ence the  suggestion  that  the  author  was  writing 
forty  years  after  the  death  of  Jesus  and  believed 
that  the  crisis  was  therefore  approaching.)  Not 
only  did  their  bones  strew  the  wilderness,  but  God 
sentenced  them  to  perpetual  exclusion  from  His 
rest. 

When  Paul  wrote  a  homily  on  the  same  subject 
(in  i  Cor.  x.)  he  called  attention  to  the  idolatry  and 
immorality  of  the  Israelites.  This  writer  dwells 
rather  on  the  subtler  fact  that  hardship,  met  in  an 
unchastened  spirit,  can  lead  men  to  distrust  and 
rebel  against  God.  In  iii.  18  and  in  iv.  6  he  ascribes 
the  failure  of  the  Israelites  to  disobedience,  as  in 
iii.  19  he  attributes  it  to  want  of  faith.  To  him 
there  is  no  difference.  When  we  lose  our  child- 
like trust  in  God  we  cease  our  childlike  obedience 
to  God. 

79 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

Paul  regards  the  whole  series  of  wilderness 
incidents  as  not  only  having  been  recorded  but  as 
having  actually  happened  for  the  instruction  of  the 
Christians  of  his  own  day  (i  Cor.  x.  6,  n).  To 
this  writer  the  wilderness  story  is  rather  of  the 
nature  of  a  parable.  As  in  the  case  of  other 
parables  we  must  not  press  the  details  too  closely. 
If  these  Israelites  had  not  been  disobed'jnt  in  the 
wilderness,  would  they  have  entered  Canaan  and 
found  in  it  the  everlasting  Rest  of  God  ?  The 
next  chapter  shows  that  the  answer  would  be  "  No." 
Moreover,  if  they  did  not  enter  Canaan,  their 
descendants  did.  Are  we  to  assume  that  was 
because  they  had  more  faith  than  their  fathers  ? 
And  if  it  was  only  their  want  of  faith  and  dis- 
obedience that  excluded  them,  what  excluded  the 
heroes  whose  triumphs  of  faith  and  obedience  are 
recorded  in  chapter  xi.  ?  They  were  excluded,  he 
tells  us,  only  because  God  wanted  us  from  the 
beginning  to  share  their  bliss.  Yet  if,  in  strict 
logic,  the  application  of  the  story  leaves  something 
to  be  desired,  as  a  preacher's  warning,  a  warning 
with  the  sanction  of  God  behind  it,  it  goes  home. 

iv.  iff. 

Once  more  comes  the  appeal,  an  appeal  whose 
arguments  and  language-forms  seem  strange  to  us, 
yet  are  not  so  very  strange  when  we  take  the  trouble 
to  understand  them  ;  and  in  any  case  as  an  under- 
tone to  the  words  we  can  hear  the  beating  of  the 

80 


The  Sabbath  Rest  of  God 

shepherd  heart,  anxious  for  the  eternal  safety  of 
his  flock.  In  Psalm  xcv.  God  had  said  :  "  They 
shall  not  enter  into  my  rest."  This  writer  empha- 
sises the  first  word  "  they,"  that  is,  the  men  of  the 
desert  wanderings,  and  draws  the  inference  that, 
although  that  generation  was  not  destined  to  enter 
God's  rest,  a  later  generation  would  enter.  The 
Alexandrian  exegesis  of  the  day  allowed  more 
startling  conclusions  than  that  to  be  drawn  not 
only  from  the  word  of  Scripture  but  from  its 
silence. 

It  would  be  futile  to  ask  whether  some  later 
generation  such  as  that  of  David  or  Solomon,  or 
the  generation  that  returned  from  Babylon,  might 
not  be  said  to  have  entered  God's  "  rest."  He 
clearly  means  that  until  Christ  came  this  rest  had 
never  been  achieved.  The  desert  generation  is 
taken  as  typical,  partly  because  they  went  astray 
at  what  might  be  described  as  the  birth-crisis  of 
the  nation,  partly  because  it  was  the  generation 
referred  to  in  his  proof-text,  Psalm  xcv. 

But  what  is  God's  "  rest  "  ?  The  phrase  takes 
us  back  to  the  creation-story,  when  "  God  finished 
on  the  sixth  day  "  (as  in  the  Greek  O.T.)  "  His 
works  which  He  had  made,  and  rested  on  the 
seventh  day  .  .  .  from  all  His  works  which  He 
began  "  (as  in  the  Greek)  "  to  make  "  (Gen.  ii.  2,  3). 
The  conception  of  God  that  underlies  the  whole 
Old  Testament  forbids  us  to  think  of  God's  rest 
as  meaning   inactivity.     No   nation   has   ever   con- 

81  F 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

ceived  so  unreservedly  as  the  Jews  an  unceasing 
activity  of  God  in  all  that  happens.  The  virulence 
of  Pharisaic  antipathy  to  Jesus  is  explained  partly 
by  Jesus'  attitude  to  this  very  question  :  whether 
the  Sabbath  rest  means  idleness  or  beneficent  work. 
In  the  fourth  Gospel  Jesus  defends  His  Sabbath 
cures  by  an  appeal  to  God's  unresting  labours  : 
44  My  Father  works  on  till  now.  I  too  work 
on  "  (v.  17). 

The  interpretation  put  on  God's  rest  by  the 
author  of  "  To  the  Hebrews  "  is  thus  a  fine  piece 
of  Christian  optimism.  At  first  sight  we  seem 
here  to  be  farther  away  from  modern  Christian 
thought  than  at  any  other  point  in  the  epistle. 
How  can  we  continue  to  speak  of  God's  rest,  a 
phrase  taken  from  the  very  beginning  of  the  Bible  ? 
Did  not  the  story  of  man's  sin  come  after  that, 
with  the  pain  and  the  shame  and  the  contest  against 
overwhelming  odds  that  again  and  again  seemed 
all  but  to  break  him  ?  Did  God  stand  outside  of 
it  all,  resting  ?  Do  not  the  stories  of  the  Good 
Shepherd  and  the  father  of  the  prodigal,  does  not 
the  story  of  the  Crucifixion  mean  that  God  grieves 
at  our  sin  and  suffers  with  our  suffering,  and  yearns 
with  a  Father  love  for  our  redemption  ? 

It  is  all  true  ;  yet  there  is  a  sense  in  which  for 
God  with  the  creation  of  man  the  struggle  was 
over.  Temptation  would  come  and  downfall,  bitter 
suffering  and  humiliating  defeat  ;  and  yet  the 
triumphant  end  was  assured  ;    the  element  of  un- 

82 


The  Sabbath  Rest  of  God 

certainty  was  absent.  The  serpent  might  bite 
man's  heel  ;  but  the  serpent  even  in  his  hour  of 
seeming  victory  could  only  grovel  among  men's 
feet  ;  man,  standing  erect,  with  forward-looking 
eyes,  even  in  defeat  was  infinitely  nobler  than  the 
foul  thing  which  had  for  the  moment  conquered 
him.  The  writer  means  that  God  from  the  begin- 
ning had  that  feeling  of  absolute  confidence  in  final 
victory  that  permeates  the  New  Testament  ;  there 
might  be  doubt  whether  this  one  or  that  one  would 
hold  fast  ;  the  Lord  Himself  might  go  down  to 
death,  but  the  gates  of  Hades  would  never  prevail 
against  Him. 

What  then  is  meant  by  men  sharing  God's 
rest  ?  First  we  note  the  author's  certainty  that 
God  must  share  with  man,  in  accordance  with  the 
lofty  conception  of  man  that  we  have  throughout 
the  epistle.  Christians  who  are  sharers  in  Christ 
(iii.  14)  and  in  the  Holy  Spirit  (vi.  4)  are  sharers 
also  with  God,  in  His  honours  and  privileges.  But 
first  a  question  has  to  be  cleared  out  of  the  way. 
Although  the  generation  that  left  Egypt  had  not 
entered  Canaan,  yet  their  descendants  had,  and 
Joshua  had  said  to  them  :  "  The  Lord  your  God 
has  given  you  rest"  (Joshua  i.  13).  To  this  his 
answer  is  that  in  Psalm  xcv.,  written  long  after  the 
wilderness  experience,  God  had  made  a  fresh  offer 
of  salvation,  clearly  showing  that  the  first  offer 
had  not  been  accepted.  If  this  does  not  carry 
conviction,  again  we  have  to  remind  ourselves  that 

83 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

it  is  only  a  scriptural  buttress  for  his  real  argument. 
The  entrance  into  Canaan  was  then,  as  it  is  now 
in  our  hymnology,  a  parable  of  the  entrance  into 
the  eternal  rest  of  God.  The  patriarchs  too  sought 
rest  ;  but  even  those  of  them  who  sought  and 
found  the  earthly  Canaan  did  not  find  what  they 
were  seeking  ;  their  search  was  for  a  city  with 
foundations,  the  city  of  the  living  God,  built  by 
no  human  hands. 

There  is  a  certain  pathos  in  the  choice  of  the 
"  rest "  metaphor  to  indicate  the  object  of  all 
human  endeavour,  the  satisfaction  of  man's  highest 
longing.  "  Blessed  are  the  dead  who  die  in  the 
Lord  from  henceforth.  Yes,  saith  the  Spirit,  for 
they  shall  rest  from  their  labours,  for  their  works 
follow  with  them"  (Rev.  xiv.  13).  Part  of  the 
attraction  of  the  Church  of  Rome  is  just  that  it 
offers  us  rest  from  anxious  troubled  thought,  offers 
to  solve  for  us  our  perplexing  problems  of  faith 
and  conduct.  In  some  measure  at  least  the  attrac- 
tion of  the  apocalyptic  expectations  that  have  had 
so  strange  a  revival  in  our  day  is  just  that  they 
offer  to  bring  to  a  dramatic  close  the  long,  weary 
struggle  that  seems  to  come  to  nothing,  to  bring 
the  Rest  of  utter  satisfaction.  In  times  of  perse- 
cution too,  it  is  very  intelligible  that  men's  notion 
of  heaven  should  take  the  form  of  a  blessed  Rest 
with  God. 

Yet  that  was  certainly  not  the  whole  of  the 
author's  thought.     As  usual  he  thinks  of  the  fact 

84 


The   Sabbath   Rest  of  God 

of  Christ  as  but  the  second  chapter  of  a  story  whose 
first  chapter  was  told  in  the  Old  Testament,  his 
Bible.  The  generation  that  left  Egypt  had  the 
Gospel  offer  just  as  we  have  had  it.  Moses  bore 
the  reproach  of  Christ  (xi.  26).  The  rest  that  was 
open  to  them  is  ultimately  the  rest  that  is  open  to 
us.  That  is  certainly  not  a  life  of  inactivity,  but 
God's  Sabbath  rest,  the  rest  of  him  who  works 
with  quiet  confidence  because  he  knows  that  the 
end  is  certain.  There  may  indeed  very  well  be,  as 
there  certainly  is  in  Jesus'  reference  to  the  Divine 
Sabbath  in  the  fourth  Gospel,  a  hostile  allusion 
to  Rabbinic  conceptions  of  an  "  idle  "  Sabbath. 

The  question  with  which  this  writer  is  face  to 
face  is  the  question  that  confronts  us.  To  the 
Israelites  looking  back  on  the  entrance  to  Canaan 
it  seemed  as  if  this  ought  to  have  been  the  beginning 
of  the  end,  the  beginning  of  a  new  creation.  So 
in  a  sense  it  was  ;  but  the  great  outstanding  fact 
was  that  the  struggle  went  on.  The  Rest  of 
God  was  still  in  the  future.  Our  problem  is 
bigger.  The  Christ  has  come.  Men  thought  it 
was  the  beginning  of  the  end,  of  the  new  creation, 
of  the  Rest  of  God.  And  still  through  the  cen- 
turies the  struggle  has  gone  on.  Right  has  often 
been  worsted  and  innocence  debauched  ;  virtue 
and  truth  have  been  tortured  ;  mammon  and  the 
strong  right  arm  have  won  many  a  triumph,  and 
men  are  still  far  from  God  ;  as  far  as  ever,  says 
the  pessimist.     Where,  we  ask,  is  the  promise  of 

85 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

His  coming  ?  The  pre-millennarian,  and  some  who 
are  not  pre-millennarians,  tell  us  that  there  is  no 
promise  of  His  coming,  in  the  sense  in  which 
almost  from  the  first  the  Church  has  understood 
it.  The  leaven  is  not  going  to  leaven  the  whole 
lump  ;  the  mustard  seed  will  never  grow  into 
a  tree.  Our  only  hope  is  that  God  will  break 
suddenly,  overwhelmingly,  into  the  whole  futile 
process  and  end  it  all. 

This  writer  has  a  firmer  faith  in  God.  "  We 
have  entered  God's  Rest,"  he  says  ;  "  we  are 
entering  it,  //  we  have  faith"  The  struggle  goes 
on,  but  the  bitterness,  the  anxiety  have  been  taken 
out  of  it.  We  toil  on  as  men  who  know  that  the 
Creator,  through  whom  and  for  whom  are  all 
things,  the  source  and  the  goal  of  the  creation,  is 
the  Father  Almighty.  We  can  rest,  not  as  the 
idler  rests,  but  as  God  rests,  in  the  calm  confidence 
that  the  universe  is  ours.  Even  we  creatures  of 
flesh  and  blood,  in  this  world  of  temptation  and 
sin,  of  pain  and  suffering  and  hostility,  even  we 
here  and  now  can  live  in  the  world  of  eternal 
realities,  lifted  above  the  noise  of  the  strife,  through 
Him  who  has  opened  for  us  the  Way.  For  us 
the  ideal  may  be  the  real,  as  it  was  for  Paul  when 
he  called  the  weak  and  quarrelsome  Christians  of 
Corinth  saints,  saints  at  least  by  vocation,  saints 
by  potentiality. 

Yet  this  confidence  is  conditional  :  "  if  we  have 
faith."     "  Therefore  let  us  fear  "  (iv."  i).    "  There- 

86 


The   Sabbath   Rest  of  God 

fore  let  us  be  in  earnest  "  (iv.  1 1).  The  service 
of  the  living  God  needs  living  men,  always  ready 
(Matt.  xxiv.  44),  always  alert  (Matt.  xxiv.  42), 
belts  buckled  and  lamps  lighted  (Luke  xii.  3$). 

iv.  11-13 

Is  it  really,  we  seem  to  hear  the  readers  asking, 
so  very  serious  as  all  this  ?  May  we  not  hope  to 
pass  muster  with  the  others  ?  We  have  a  good 
record  behind  us  and  we  can  still  cut  quite  a 
respectable  figure.  The  Word  of  God,  the  author 
replies,  is  not  mocked.  It  is  living,  like  God 
Himself,  energising  as  He  would  have  us  energise, 
sharper  than  any  sacrificial  scalpel.  As  it  searches 
us,  it  cuts  right  through  the  psyche  and  the  spirit 
(as  we  should  say,  goes  right  through  the  mind 
to  the  very  soul).  It  can,  so  to  speak,  separate 
the  joints  from  the  marrow.  Our  inmost  thoughts 
that  we  try  to  hide  even  from  ourselves  are  not 
proof  against  it.  From  it  absolutely  nothing  is 
hid.  Before  the  Word  of  God  to  whom  we  have 
to  give  account  we  stand  naked. 

The  ideas  and  phrases  are  not  all  original. 
There  are  analogues  to  the  passage  in  the  Wisdom 
Literature,  the  apocalyptic  literature,  and  especially 
in  Philo.  The  Word  of  God  is  God  in  action, 
the  God  whose  voice  is  heard  in  the  Bible.  Psycho- 
analysts tell  us  that  if  we  would  cease  to  be  the 
victims  of  our  past  harrowing  experiences  or  our 
guilty    consciences,    we    must    first    face    our    past 

87 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

frankly,  see  it  for  what  it  is.  This  writer  tells  us 
that  in  our  self-examination  the  Word  of  God  can 
help  us  to  deal  with  our  past,  yes  even  with  our 
present,  with  an  honesty  we  could  never  reach 
unaided. 

But  God's  final  Word  is  His  Son.  The  passage 
is  a  word-picture  of  Jesus  the  Revealer  of  men  to 
themselves.  We  call  to  mind  the  searching  honesty 
of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  that  sheds  its  light 
on  many  a  dark  place  in  the  human  heart.  We 
listen  to  the  story  of  the  prodigal,  the  rich  fool, 
Dives  and  Lazarus,  the  Pharisee  and  the  tax- 
gatherer  ;  and  in  each  case  we  seem  to  hear  Jesus 
say  :  This  is  the  picture  as  the  world  sees  it  ; 
now  look  at  the  truth.  We  follow  Him  as  He 
meets  Simon  the  Pharisee  and  the  woman  of  the 
city  and  the  rich  ruler  ;  Zacchaeus  and  Pilate  and 
the  dying  thief.  In  the  light  of  the  Light  of  the 
World  we  see  them  in  their  naked  reality,  and  as 
we  see  them,  so  we  know  that  He  sees  us,  so  we 
learn  to  see  ourselves.  "  Let  us  then  be  in  deadly 
earnest." 


88 


CHAPTER    VIII 

IN   THE    DAYS   OF    HIS    FLESH 
(iv.   14-v.  14) 

The  preacher  who  has  uttered  this  stern  message 
of  the  inescapable  truth  of  God,  that  pierces  through 
the  most  specious  of  shams  and  knows  us  better 
than  we  know  ourselves,  changes  his  tone  and 
becomes  the  Christian  evangelist.  In  winning 
words  that  have  moved  generation  after  generation 
of  disheartened  men  and  women  to  face  life's 
struggles  again  with  a  new  heart,  he  tells  them  of 
God's  graciousness  and  pity.  The  God  who 
knows  our  littleness  and  our  failure  also  knows  our 
weakness  and  our  strivings. 

iv.   i4f. 

We  come  closer  now  to  the  subject  of  which  we 
have  twice  had  a  hint  (ii.  17  and  iii.  1),  Jesus  as 
our  high  priest.  If  Jesus  discovered  pettiness  and 
foulness  in  men  to  whom  the  world  looked  up, 
He  also  saw  a  memorable  sacrifice  where  others 
noticed  only  a  poor  woman  dropping  a  penny  in 
a  box  ;  the  ointment,  in  which  the  bystanders 
read  only  culpable  extravagance,  spoke  to  Him  of 
grateful  love  ;  what  to  the  eyes  of  conventional 
piety  was  a  harlot  plying  her  trade  was  to  Him  a 

89 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

rapture  of  penitence  and  devotion.  He  taught  men 
to  see  unsuspected  possibilities  of  goodness  and 
greatness  in  the  most  unpromising  material.  If 
on  the  one  hand  Jesus  is  God's  Word,  on  the 
other  He  is  our  great  High  Priest.  As  the 
Levitical  high  priest  passed  through  the  outer 
sanctuary  to  the  inner,  so  Jesus  has  passed  through 
the  heavens  (which  in  Jewish  theology  separated 
men  from  God)  right  into  the  presence  of  God. 

It  is  with  no  hostile  God  that  our  high  priest 
pleads  our  cause,  for  He  Himself  is  God's  Son, 
the  radiance  of  God's  glory  ;  so  that  it  is  God's 
mind  and  purpose  that  speak  through  Him.  "  Let 
us  cling  to  our  confession  since  we  have  this  gospel 
of  Jesus  as  our  high  priest." 

At  this  point  the  writer  anticipates  an  objection. 
"  This  Jesus,  our  high  priest,  is  and  was  a  heavenly 
being,  such  as  the  writer  describes  in  the  opening 
verses  of  the  epistle  ;  a  being  of  another  order  than 
ours,  who  can  look  on  our  temptations  with  sym- 
pathy perhaps,  but  not  with  the  sympathy  that  is 
born  of  experience  since  He  Himself  is  raised  far 
above  all  possibility  of  sin."  The  author  was  in 
far  too  close  touch  with  the  Gospel  tradition  to 
allow  this  for  a  moment. 

In  his  passionate  repudiation  of  the  suggestion 
we  hear  the  echo  of  the  story  of  Jesus'  tempta- 
tions, told  with  a  vivid  realisation  of  the  mortal 
struggle  that  lay  behind  the  apparently  simple 
narrative  ;    of  Jesus'  growing    consciousness    that 

90 


In   the   Days   of  His   Flesh 

the  way  of  life  was  the  way  of  the  Cross,  of  the 
attempt  of  well-meaning  friends  to  turn  Him  from 
that  way.  We  can  feel  behind  it  a  realisation  of 
the  pain  at  the  heart  of  Jesus  as  one  after  another 
of  those  of  whom  He  had  formed  high  hopes 
turned  away,  until  finally  "  all  the  disciples  forsook 
Him  and  fled."  The  author  knew  of  His  shrink- 
ing from  the  cup  His  Father  had  given  Him  to 
drink  ;  knew  also — may  we  not  assume  ? — that 
the  story  of  the  Cross  itself  had  shown  how  truly 
it  was  flesh  and  blood  that  was  impaled  on  the 
Cross,  however  much  the  Gospel  tradition  had 
drawn  a  veil  of  kindly  silence  over  that  side  of  the 
tragedy.  Above  all,  He  knew  of  the  cry  of  desola- 
tion in  the  Garden,  knew  that  if  his  readers  were 
tempted  to  think  that  God  had  forgotten  them, 
their  high  priest  with  far  more  reason  had  been 
for  a  moment  tempted  to  think  that  God  had 
forgotten  Him. 

Our  high  priest  then  is  also  our  leader  ;  He 
asks  us  to  go  into  no  region  of  temptation  or 
suffering  He  has  not  first  trodden  Himself.  "  Yet 
without  sin."  Does  that  not,  we  ask,  limit  His 
power  of  sympathy  ?  Do  not  some  of  our  fiercest 
temptations  come  from  our  past  yielding  ?  We  are 
indeed  sometimes  told  that  those  who  have  fallen 
and  risen  again  can  most  surely  speak  the  word 
of  hope  to  those  who  are  down.  But  the  Christian 
instinct  of  this  writer  and  of  the  young  Church 
speaks  more  truly.     We  expect  every  minister  of 

91 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

the  Christian  Gospel  to  be  a  knight  without  fear 
and  without  reproach.  Every  stain  on  his  honour, 
however  sincerely  it  may  be  repented  of,  is  a  handi- 
cap in  his  ministry  ;  and  there  comes  a  point  of 
moral  failure  beyond  which  usefulness  in  the 
ministry  is  ended.  Christian  men  want  to  feel 
that  their  leaders  know  their  temptations  ;  they  also 
want  to  feel  that  it  is  not  beyond  human  strength 
and  the  grace  of  God  to  surmount  them.  Outside 
of  the  Synoptic  tradition  this  epistle  alone  emphasises 
the  possibility  that  Jesus  might  fall  ;  the  New 
Testament  witness  is  unanimous  that  He  did  not. 
It  was  unfortunate  that  the  Church  hit  on  the 
negative  and  inert  phrase,  "  the  sinlessness  of 
Jesus,"  to  describe  what  was  in  fact  a  positive, 
living,  loving  holiness.  We  are  told  that  the 
conception  of  a  sinless  Messiah  had  arisen  before 
the  days  of  Jesus,  and  that  therefore,  when  men 
accepted  Him  as  Messiah,  that  He  was  sinless 
followed  as  a  corollary.  It  is  claimed  that  the 
origin  of  the  conception  of  the  "  sinless  "  Messiah 
can  be  traced  in  the  Old  Testament.  Only 
animals  without  "  blemish  "  were  used  in  sacrifice, 
and  the  innocent  victim  of  Isaiah  liii.  suffered 
although  "  he  committed  no  sin  nor  (uttered) 
guile  with  his  mouth "  (v.  9,  Greek  version).  In 
1  Peter,  Christ  sacrificed  is  compared  to  a  lamb 
"unblemished  and  spotless"  (i.  19),  and  in  ii.  22 
this  very  verse  of  Isaiah  is  quoted.  But  surely 
the  fact  suggested  the  quotations  rather  than  the 

9* 


In  the   Days  of  His   Flesh 

quotations  the  fact.  That  the  story  of  Jesus  led 
the  early  Church  to  discover  Isaiah  liii.  shows  how 
deeply  the  followers  of  Jesus  had  been  impressed 
by  this  among  other  things  :  that  nothing  that  He 
suffered  was  the  penalty  of  His  own  wrong-doing. 
He  was  the  lamb  led  to  the  slaughter. 

The  Church  soon  became  sensitive  on  the 
point — unnecessarily  sensitive  as  it  seems  to  us  ; 
as  when  Matthew  shrinks  from  letting  Jesus  say  : 
"  Why  do  you  call  me  good  ?  No  one  is  good 
but  God"  (Mark  x.  1 8  ;  cf.  Matt.  xix.  17),  or 
feels  that  His  baptism  is  something  that  calls  for 
explanation  (Matt.  iii.  14,  15).  A  study  of  the 
charges  that  some  in  our  own  time  have  brought 
against  the  character  of  Jesus,  such  as  uncharit- 
ableness  or  temper  in  His  dealings  with  the 
Pharisees,  makes  a  fine  exercise  in  ethical  judgment. 
Whatever  Jesus  may  have  meant  by  "  Why  do 
you  call  me  good  ?  "  in  the  generation  that  was 
nearest  to  Him  historically,  it  does  not  seem  to 
have  suggested  that  He  felt  any  sense  of  guilt  or 
had  anything  but  unbroken  communion  with  God  ; 
nor  is  there  any  trace  of  such  a  suggestion  in  any 
stratum  of  the  Gospel  records.  Jesus  was  captain 
of  our  salvation  in  this  sense  also,  that  where  He 
led  there  we  may  safely  follow. 

ir.  16 

"  Let  us  then  draw  near,"  so  runs  the  refrain 
of  this   epistle,    "  with   confidence   to  the  throne," 

93 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

the  judgment-throne  which  through  Jesus  we  know 
to  be  even  more  gloriously  a  throne  "  of  grace." 
There  we  shall  find  pity  that  issues  in  gracious, 
timely  help.  In  the  parable  it  was  not  the 
tax-gatherer  but  the  Pharisee  who  approached 
the  throne  of  God  "  with  boldness."  But  the 
conscience-stricken,  self-abasing  attitude  of  the 
tax-gatherer,  however  it  may  become  the  newly 
awakened  conscience,  is  not  meant  to  be  typical 
of  the  Christian  life.  "  Let  us  through  Jesus  draw 
near  with  confidence  to  the  throne  of  grace " 
might  be  taken  as  the  motto  not  only  of  this  epistle 
but  of  the  New  Testament. 


The  author  now  conceived  it  to  be  his  duty  to 
show  how  Jesus  fulfils  the  qualifications  of  the 
priesthood.  He  takes  them  point  by  point,  and 
in  the  course  of  his  exposition  the  argument  breaks 
through  the  narrow  Scriptural  limits  within  which 
he  is  trying  to  work.  Some  of  the  biggest  things 
in  the  priesthood  of  Jesus  have  no  analogue 
among  other  priests,  (i)  The  priest  who  is  to 
represent  men  before  God  is  himself  a  man, 
"  clothed  in  weakness  "  as  in  a  mantle.  The 
Jewish  priest  lived  his  life  among  his  people  ;  it 
was  as  obvious  to  all  as  to  himself  that  he  had  to 
sacrifice  for  his  own  sins  as  well  as  for  theirs. 
Jesus  too  had  been  "  taken  from  among  men," 
for  God   had    said    to  Him,    "  Thou  art  my  Son  ; 

94 


In  the  Days  of  His   Flesh 

to-day  have  I  become  thy  Father."  The  author 
may  well  have  known  of  kindly  sympathetic  priests  ; 
but  the  picture  he  draws  of  the  true  priest,  in  his 
attitude  to  those  who  "  go  stray  in  ignorance " 
(v.  2) — a  phrase  reminiscent  of  the  parables  of  the 
lost  sheep  and  the  lost  son — is  a  picture  of  Jesus. 
(According  to  Jewish  theology  "  presumptuous  " 
sins  were  unforgivable  ;  but  "  presumption  "  and 
"  ignorance  "  must  surely  have  been  understood 
in  a  wider  sense  than  now.) 

v.  4-7 

(2)  No  priest  arrogates  to  himself  the  title  of 
priest.  Only  God  can  call  a  man  to  the  priesthood, 
as  in  the  priestly  tradition  He  called  Aaron 
(Ex.  xxviii.  1).  (Professor  Dods  quotes  the  heading 
of  Anselm's  letters  :  "  Brother  Anselm,  monk  of 
Bee  by  choice,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  by 
violence.")  That  Jesus'  priesthood  was  not  self- 
sought  is  proved  in  the  usual  way  by  a  Scripture 
quotation  :  "  Thou  art  a  priest  for  ever  after  the 
order  of  Melchizedec  "  ;  but  a  far  more  convincing 
proof  is  the  story  of  Gethsemane,  which  had  made 
so  deep  an  impression  on  the  mind  of  the  early 
Church.  In  the  vivid  tradition  known  to  this 
writer,  Jesus,  "  with  loud  outcries  and  with  tears, 
offered  both  prayers  and  supplications  to  Him 
who  was  able  to  save  Him  out  of  death." 

What  does  the  author  conceive  Jesus  as  praying 
for  ?     Surely  not  for  deliverance  from  the  physical 

95 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

experience  of  death.  His  prayer,  whatever  it  was, 
was  answered.  "  He  was  heard  for  His  godly 
fear,"  which,  as  in  the  case  of  Paul's  thorn  in  the 
flesh,  may  mean,  not  that  He  was  spared  the  ex- 
perience He  dreaded,  but  that  He  learned  to  receive 
it  as  the  Father's  will  for  the  Son  (cf.  Matt.  xxvi. 
39,  42).  But  to  this  writer  that  does  not  exhaust 
the  answer  to  the  prayer. 

In  our  thought  of  the  mystery  of  the  Agony  we 
are  tempted  to  be  too  theological.  There  was 
enough  in  the  immediate  surroundings  to  explain 
the  feeling  of  intolerable  disappointment  that  was 
breaking  Jesus'  spirit.  He  had  begun  His  minis- 
try with  such  high  hopes,  on  fire  with  the  message 
that  God's  Kingdom  was  at  the  door,  had  in  fact 
already  arrived.  To  Him  the  radiance  of  the 
glory  that  was  to  be,  filled  the  whole  horizon  ; 
He  could  not  understand  how  men  preferred  their 
own  little  rushlights.  For  Him  the  lustre  of  the 
precious  pearl  He  brought  outshone  all  other 
lustre  ;  and  He  had  tried  to  make  men  see  it  as 
He  saw  it.  All  through  His  work  He  had  had 
no  ambition  but  to  go  on,  helping,  forgiving, 
inspiring,  leading  men  to  God.  And  this  was  the 
end  !  It  was  not  only  that  Jew  and  heathen, 
priest  and  people,  official  and  citizen,  had  joined 
in  bringing  Him  to  death,  but  the  consciousness 
that  in  what  they  did  they  were  only  "  people." 
Let  one  who  is  the  radiance  of  God's  glory,  the 
impress  of  God's  essence,  come  among  men,  even 

96 


In  the  Days   of  His   Flesh 

among  God's  chosen  people  ;  this  is  how  they  will 
respond.  In  all  this  there  was  enough  to  account 
for  the  cry  :  "  Father,  if  it  be  Thy  will,  let  this  cup 
pass  from  me." 

v.  8-10 

(3)  The  priest  is  appointed  to  represent  men  in 
the  things  of  God.  How  fully  Jesus  opened  up 
for  men  the  way  to  God  the  epistle  will  show  later. 
(4)  The  priest  offers  vegetable  and  animal  sacri- 
fices for  sins  ;  later  we  are  to  hear  what  Jesus 
offered.  But  this  priest  had  qualifications  for  His 
work  of  which  the  Levitical  priest  had  no  need. 
Though  He  was  a  Son,  He  learnt  suffering  by 
obedience.  The  phrase  was  ordinarily  applied  to 
the  needed  chastening  of  an  undisciplined  nature  ; 
courage  was  needed  to  apply  it  to  Jesus.  He  did 
not  from  the  beginning  know  the  full  bitterness 
of  the  cup  He  had  to  drink  ;  but  as  each  new 
experience  came  He  accepted  it  from  the  Father's 
hand.  Thus,  in  one  of  the  author's  favourite 
phrases,  He  was  "  perfected,"  fully  equipped,  to 
be  the  high  priest  of  sinful,  suffering  humanity. 

v.  11-14 

Next  begins  a  section  of  some  difficulty  but  of 
great  interest,  in  which  the  author  speaks  as  teacher  ; 
addressing  pupils  who  are  disheartened  and  un- 
responsive, and  therefore  from  the  teacher's  point 
of  view  highly  unsatisfactory  material.  Like  a 
wise    teacher    he    is    more    concerned    about    the 

97  c 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

progress  of  his  pupils  than  about  the  consistency 
of  his  own  language.  Thus  in  v.  1 1  he  tells  them 
they  have  become  "  sluggish  "  of  hearing  :  a  few 
verses  later  he  expresses  the  longing  that  a  new 
earnestness  may  prevent  them  from  becoming 
"sluggish"  (vi.  12).  He  begins  by  saying  they 
are  too  immature  spiritually  to  take  in  any  but  the 
most  elementary  Christian  teaching  ;  then  he  pro- 
ceeds to  give  them  that  "  difficult "  instruction 
which  he  has  just  declared  to  be  beyond  them. 
In  parabolic  form  he  gives  a  solemn  warning 
about  the  fate  of  "  fruitless  "  Christians  (vi.  7,  8), 
and  then  assures  them  that  their  past  record 
is  a  guarantee  that  this  fate  will  not  be  theirs. 
Without  minimising  the  seriousness  of  their 
present  condition,  their  teacher  recognises  and 
even  exaggerates  every  encouraging  symptom  they 
show. 

"  I  have,"  he  writes,  "  a  good  deal  to  say  to  you 
about  the  Melchizedec  priesthood  of  Christ.  It 
is  hard  for  me  to  make  my  meaning  clear  when 
my  pupils  are  so  backward.  It  is  so  long  since 
your  conversion  that  you  should  now  be  teaching 
others.  Far  from  that  you  ought  to  be  sent  back 
in  disgrace  to  the  kindergarten  class  to  learn  the 
A  B  C  of  Christian  truth.  It  is  milk  you  need,  not 
solid  food.  One  who  is  on  milk  diet  has  no  skill 
to  distinguish  between  right  and  wrong.  Solid 
food  is  for  grown-ups  who  by  practice  have  trained 
their  faculties  to  know  truth  from  error.     Yet  we 

98 


In  the  Days  of  His   Flesh 

must  make  the  effort.  Let  us  get  beyond  the 
teaching  we  give  catechumens  and  pass  on  to  a 
higher  stage." 

Those  who  plead  for  the  perpetual  preaching 
of  "  the  simple  Gospel  "  get  no  support  from  this 
Christian  teacher.  To  him  the  constant  preaching 
of  elementary  truth  leads  to  intellectual  laziness, 
which  in  turn  issues  in  spiritual  and  moral  sluggish- 
ness. In  spite  of  his  doubts  about  his  readers' 
ability  to  follow  his  argument,  he  will  make  the 
attempt.  He  is  quite  certain  in  any  case  that  this 
is  the  kind  of  instruction  they  need.  They  are 
not  bad-hearted,  but  only  down-hearted  ;  a  new 
vision,  a  glimpse  from  a  new  angle  of  the  Jesus 
they  have  so  long  known,  will  give  them  back 
their  old  martial  bearing  that  they  have  so  sadly 
lost  (xii.  12). 

One  of  the  great  needs  of  the  Church  to-day  is 
patient,  systematic  instruction  on  the  meaning  of 
the  Christian  religion  and  its  application  to  life, 
imparted  by  earnest  teachers  who  are  men  of  open 
minds,  who  have  paid  the  price  in  thought  and 
study  for  being  teachers,  who  are  not  afraid  of  new 
ideas  or  of  leading  their  people  into  new  truth, 
even  at  the  cost  of  some  unpleasantness  to  them- 
selves. We  have  plenty  of  preaching  ;  too  much, 
some  might  say  ;  but  it  is  of  so  haphazard  a 
nature,  and  so  much  of  it  is  just  the  old  song  to 
the  old  tune,  that  the  result  is  quite  incommensurate 
with  the  quantity. 

99 


CHAPTER    IX 

AN   ANCIENT   CREED 
(vi.   1-20) 

Of  special  interest  in  this  passage  are  the  two 
verses  that  mention  the  six  points  that  were  then 
regarded  as  the  basic  truths  of  the  Christian  creed. 
These  verses  have  been  carefully  scanned  to  see 
whether  they  shed  any  light  on  the  question 
whether  the  readers  were  "  Hebrews  "  or  Gentile 
Christians.  We  know  from  Romans  i.  how  deeply 
Paul  was  impressed  with  the  moral  effects  of 
polytheism.  We  gather  from  1  Thessalonians  i.  9, 
as  indeed  we  should  expect  from  the  analogy  of 
modern  missionary  experience,  that  an  attack  on 
polytheism  was  an  element  in  Paul's  preaching  in 
Thessalonica.  The  apparent  absence  of  any  positive 
teaching  on  the  nature  of  God  such  as  would  be 
given  to  polytheistic  idolaters  would  strengthen  the 
case  of  those  who  think  the  readers  were  Christian 
Jews  ;  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  we  do  not 
know  how  much  teaching  was  covered  by  "  faith 
in  God,"  and  that  in  any  case  we  need  not 
suppose  the  creed  was  specially  drawn  up  for  this 
community. 

100 


An   Ancient   Creed 

vi.  1-3 

The  six  items  of  instruction  are  indicated  by 
short,  pithy  phrases  which  are  really  "  captions," 
brief  titles  suitable  for  the  purpose  of  reference  or 
description.  They  tell  us  practically  nothing  of 
the  contents  of  these  "  articles "  in  the  creed. 
About  these  contents  we  can  only  guess  ;  yet  we 
are  not  altogether  guessing  in  the  dark.  The 
atmosphere  of  this  epistle  is  in  some  respects  very 
like  that  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  and  the  book  of 
"  Acts."  In  "  Acts  "  especially  there  are  repeated 
references  to  points  of  Christian  instruction,  which 
would  be  suitably  indicated  by  the  titles  men- 
tioned in  these  verses.  The  six  captions  are  : 
"  Repentance  from  dead  works,"  "  Faith  in  God," 
teaching  of  "  Ablutions,"  of  "  Laying  on  of 
hands,"  of  the  "  Resurrection  of  the  dead,"  of 
11  Eternal  judgment."  The  fact  that  these  are 
only  titles  may  explain  also  the  otherwise  curious 
fact  of  the  apparent  absence  of  any  direct  reference 
to  Jesus. 

Evidently  they  go  in  pairs.  The  first  two, 
11  repentance  from  dead  works "  and  "  faith  in 
God,"  take  us  back  to  the  very  beginning  of  the 
Gospel  history,  when  Jesus  preached,  "  Repent 
and  have  faith  in  the  Gospel."  The  phrase  "  from 
dead  works  "  may  be  the  writer's  own.  In  ix.  14 
he  uses  the  same  phrase  :  "  The  blood  of  Christ 
will  purify  our  conscience  from  dead  works," 
where  the  inference  has   been   drawn   that  "  dead 

IOI 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

works  "  are  such  as  defile  the  conscience  ;  just  as 
in  Jewish  and  Hindu  theology  a  corpse  defiles 
anything  that  touches  it.  The  real  meaning,  how- 
ever, is  shown  in  the  words  that  complete  the 
sentence  :  "to  serve  the  living  God."  Part  of 
our  difficulty  with  the  word  "  works,"  which  occurs 
so  often  in  the  New  Testament,  is  our  want  of  an 
English  equivalent  for  the  Greek  "  erga."  "  Con- 
duct "  is  perhaps  our  nearest  equivalent.  To  this 
author  conduct  not  inspired  by  the  living  God  is 
lifeless  and  defiling.  If  Moses  had  stayed  in 
Egypt  he  would  have  lived  a  life  of  "  sin  "  (xi.  25), 
not  necessarily  a  life  of  wickedness,  but  a  life  apart 
from  God.      He  would  have  been  an  "  apostate." 

It  is  certainly  striking  that  the  second  "  article  " 
is  headed  "  faith  in  God  "  rather  than  "  faith  in 
Christ,"  though  perhaps  not  any  more  striking 
than  the  absence  of  the  name  of  Jesus  from  the 
"  Acts  "  account  of  Paul's  mission  address  to  the 
Athenians  (xvii.  22—31).  We  seem  here  to  have 
a  reminiscence  of  the  preaching  of  Jesus  of  which 
11  Have  faith  in  God "  was  one  of  the  leading 
motives. 

The  next  two  "  articles,"  teaching  on  "  ablu- 
tions "  and  on  "  the  laying  on  of  hands,"  are  well 
illustrated  by  the  story  told  at  the  beginning  of 
Acts  xix.,  about  Paul  finding  at  Ephesus  about  a 
dozen  people  who  apparently  were  regarded  as  in 
some  sense  Christian,  but  who  had  been  baptised 
only  with  John's   baptism.     After  some   teaching 

10a 


An    Ancient    Creed 

Paul  baptised  them  again,  this  time  in  the  name 
of  the  Lord  Jesus.  He  further  "  laid  hands  on 
them "  and  "  the  Holy  Spirit  came  upon  them." 
We  gather,  then,  that  the  "  article  "  on  "  the  laying 
on  of  hands  "  would  deal  with  the  gift  of  the  Holy 
Spirit. 

The  article  on  "  baptisms  "  would  presumably 
deal  with  the  distinction,  not  only  between  the 
Baptist's  baptism  and  baptism  in  the  name  of 
Jesus,  but  with  the  distinction  between  them  both 
and  the  various  other  "  baptisms  "  and  religious 
41  ablutions  "  of  the  time.  For  example,  Jewish 
proselytes  were  baptised,  and  "  ablutions  "  of  some 
kind  were  evidently  common  in  the  world  religions 
of  the  time,  as  they  are  still.  The  importance  of 
ritual  ablutions  in  Hindu  ceremonial  accounts  for 
the  fact  that  Hindu  temples  are  so  often  found 
beside  lakes  or  on  the  banks  of  rivers.  Indeed 
the  word  used  by  the  author  here  is  not  the  regular 
word  for  Christian  baptism  (baptismd),  but  the 
word  for  ablutions  or  washings  (baptismos).  On 
the  only  occasion  on  which  the  word  is  used  in  the 
Gospels  it  refers  to  the  ritual  washing  of  kitchen 
utensils.  If  one  could  be  quite  sure  that  we 
are  here  in  contact  with  the  unadulterated  tradi- 
tion of  Jesus'  teaching,  we  might  with  some 
certainty  assume  that  the  article  referred  not  to 
baptism  at  all,  but  to  the  uselessness  of  the 
elaborate  precautions  taken  to  ensure  ceremonial 
"  cleanness." 

103 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

Again,  when  Jesus  "  laid  on  hands  "  it  was  with 
the  kindly  touch  of  healing  or  of  blessing.  "  He 
laid  hands  on  each  one  of  them  and  healed  them  " 
(Luke  iv.  40).  "  He  took  them  in  His  arms  and 
blessed  them  fervently,  laying  hands  upon  them  " 
(Mark  x.  16).  "And  stretching  out  His  hand 
He  touched  him,  saying, '  I  will,  be  thou  cleansed  '  " 
(Matt.  viii.  3).  Jesus'  custom  of  giving  the  touch 
of  benediction  was  no  doubt  one  reason  for  the 
continuance  in  the  Christian  Church  of  the  cere- 
monial laying  on  of  hands,  which,  as  has  been 
suggested,  may  have  originally  signified  the  trans- 
ference of  power  from  father  to  son  or  from  prophet 
to  disciple,  or  the  identification  of  the  worshipper 
with  his  sacrifice.  At  all  events  the  custom  was 
evidently  from  an  early  date,  often  no  doubt  with 
more  than  a  touch  of  superstition,  associated  with 
the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit. 

The  two  last  articles,  "  the  resurrection  of  the 
dead  "  and  "  eternal  judgment,"  are  illustrated 
in  Peter's  address  to  Cornelius  and  his  friends 
and  the  subsequent  story  (Acts  x.  4off.).  In  this 
passage  reference  is  made  to  the  resurrection  of 
Jesus,  and  to  Jesus  as  judge  of  the  living  and  the 
dead,  as  well  as  to  faith  in  Jesus,  remission  of 
sins,  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit  and  baptism.  In 
Acts  i.  22  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  is  spoken  of, 
almost  as  if  the  proclamation  of  it  were  the  whole 
work  of  an  apostle.  One  of  the  subjects  of  Paul's 
testimony   before   Felix  was   the  future  judgment 

104 


An    Ancient    Creed 

(Acts  xxiv.  25).  In  1  Corinthians  xv.  3ff.  it  is 
possible  that  we  have  something  like  the  exact 
words  of  the  article  on  the  resurrection  ;  for  Paul  is 
evidently  here  handing  on  traditional  elementary 
Church  teaching. 

In  this  list  of  fundamentals  the  absence  is  notice- 
able of  any  reference  to  the  other  item  of  traditional 
elementary  Christian  teaching  to  which  Paul  refers 
in  1  Corinthians,  viz.  the  Lord's  Supper  (xi.  23rT.). 
It  is  a  little  difficult  to  take  seriously  the  suggestion 
that  the  omission  is  due  to  the  fact  that  the  Lord's 
Supper  was  a  secret  cult  meal  of  the  Church. 
Perhaps  it  is  rather  to  be  classed  with  other 
phenomena  which  suggest  that  in  this  document  we 
are  in  touch  with  a  peculiarly  unecclesiastical  and 
non-sacerdotal  type  of  Christianity  ;  such  are  the 
absence  of  all  mention  of  Church  officials  and  of 
any  certain  reference  to  baptism.  It  is  however 
very  possible  to  exaggerate  the  force  of  the  argu- 
ment from  silence.  In  Paul's  most  elaborate 
writing,  the  epistle  to  the  Romans,  baptism  is 
mentioned  only  once  and  the  Lord's  Supper  not 
at  all.  In  "  Hebrews  "  itself  the  resurrection  of 
Jesus,  which  is  assumed  throughout,  is  directly 
mentioned  only  once  (xiii.  20). 

If  we  cannot  fill  in  all  the  details  of  the  six 
"  articles  "  we  can  at  least  get  the  general  con- 
ception of  the  Christian  religion  held  before  the 
minds  of  catechumens  in  the  Church  to  which 
this  epistle  is  directed.      Christians  were  men  called 

105 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

to  a  new  way  of  life,  which  could  be  lived  only  by 
faith  in  God  ;  men  who,  by  being  baptised  in  the 
name  of  Jesus,  had  publicly  declared  their  allegiance 
to  Him  ;  whose  life  had  been  quickened  and 
enriched  by  a  new  access  of  spiritual  power  ; 
whose  life  was  not  limited  by  the  death  of  the  body, 
and  who  were  delivered  from  all  forms  of  pettiness 
by  their  assurance  that  their  lives  were  deciding 
their  immortal  destiny. 

vi.  4,  5 

That  this  is  something  like  the  conception  in 
the  author's  mind  is  clear  from  the  next  section  in 
which  he  gives  his  own  characterisation  of  Christians. 
Every  phrase  suggests  that  same  thrill  as  of  a  new 
revelation,  of  the  heavens  opened,  of  life  lifted  on 
to  new  levels,  that  we  get  in  the  Gospels  and  in 
"  Acts."  In  spite  of  the  six  "  articles  "  of  the 
faith,  to  be  a  Christian  is  not  to  be  able  to  pass  an 
examination  in  a  creed.  It  is  to  have  received 
"  illumination."  (We  think  of  Jesus'  saying  :  "  I 
am  the  light  of  the  world"  (John  viii.  12)  ;  still 
more  of  "  Ye  are  the  light  of  the  world  "  in  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount  (Matt.  v.  14)  ;  of  what 
the  writer  to  the  Ephesians  calls  "  the  illuminated 
eyes  of  the  heart"  (i.  18).  Later  "illumination" 
became  a  technical  term  for  baptism.) 

They  have  tasted  the  heavenly  gift,  been  initiated 
into  experiences  hitherto  undreamed  of ;  have 
become   participators   in   the   Holy   Spirit,   in   His 

106 


An    Ancient    Creed 

gifts  such  as  Paul  describes  in  I  Corinthians  xii.  ; 
have  been  led  to  the  discovery  and  the  exercise  of 
unsuspected  latent  capacities  in  themselves  ;  they 
have  tasted  the  revelation  of  God  how  good  it  is, 
with  a  wonder  even  greater  than  that  of  the  psalmist 
who  had  sung  "  Taste  and  see  that  Jehovah  is 
good  "  (Psa.  xxxiv.  8).  They  have  not  indeed  seen 
the  glory  of  God  revealed  without  restraint  or 
limitation  in  all  the  glory  that  is  to  be  ;  but  they 
have,  as  it  were,  experienced  the  working  of  the 
advance-guard  of  the  forces  of  the  kingdom,  that 
are  at  work  even  in  this  age  (i  Cor.  xii.  28). 

vi.  6-8 

The  readers  had  not  been  able  to  live  at  this 
high  level.  It  is  the  anxious  care  of  their  teacher 
that  their  drooping  faith  should  be  revived.  He 
feels  that  this  will  happen  if  only  they  can  be 
made  to  see  the  vision  as  he  sees  it.  For  most 
of  us  too  the  illumination  of  our  soul  must  be 
the  reflected  light  from  that  which  God  has  given 
some  seer.  Here  there  is  a  special  reason  for  the 
glowing  description  of  the  first  days  of  the 
Christian  life.  The  author  believes  that  if  those 
who  have  once  known  the  thrill  of  Christian  joys 
afterwards  fall  away,  their  doom  is  sealed.  For 
them  a  second  repentance  is  impossible.  Nor  is 
this  with  him  a  passing  mood  of  despondency. 
Twice  he  returns  to  the  subject  (x.  26fT.,  xii.  17). 
Both  times  he  is  as  certain  as  he  is  here  that  he 

107 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

who  flings  away  his  birthright  flings  it  away  for 
ever.  These  verses  have  in  large  measure  formed 
the  battleground  between  those  who  maintained 
and  those  who  denied  the  possibility  of  a  second 
repentance. 

To  get  the  author's  point  of  view  we  have  to 
remember  that  here,  as  elsewhere  throughout  the 
New  Testament,  we  are  in  the  atmosphere  of  a 
mission  Church,  whose  members  are  surrounded 
by  non-Christians,  continually  on  the  watch.  We 
read  these  sentences,  not  as  an  eternal  decree  of 
God  uttered  through  this  writer  as  God's  mouth- 
piece, but  as  the  judgment  of  a  mature  Christian 
thinker  and  teacher  on  a  point  of  great  importance 
in  religious  psychology,  a  judgment  moreover  based 
on  experience  as  well  as  theory.  It  is  not  only 
that  the  spiritual  and  emotional  accompaniments 
of  conversion,  as  he  has  just  described  them,  are 
of  a  nature  which  cannot  be  repeated  ;  if  we 
abandon  our  loyalty,  in  the  nature  of  the  case  we 
abandon  it  for  good. 

But  besides  this  subjective  consideration,  for  a 
Christian  in  a  mission  Church  to  go  back  on  his 
profession  is  for  all  practical  purposes  to  declare 
to  the  "  heathen  "  and  Jewish  neighbours  that  the 
claims  made  by  and  for  Jesus  were  false  ;  it  is  to 
side  with  the  enemies  of  Jesus.  The  disloyal  take 
part  in  the  crucifixion  of  Jesus  in  so  far  as  it  is 
possible  for  them  to  do  so.  The  men  of  whom  the 
author  is  thinking  have,  by  deliberate,  open  apostasy, 

108 


An    Ancient    Creed 

put  Jesus  out  of  their  lives,  and  so  with  their  own 
hands  shut  for  ever  the  door  of  hope. 

Paul,  who  had  presumably  a  far  wider  experience 
of  mission  work  than  the  author  of  "  To  the 
Hebrews,"  does  not  take  such  despondent  views. 
In  his  paean  of  praise  to  God  at  the  end  of  Romans  viii. 
nothing  can  separate  the  Christian  from  God's 
love  revealed  in  Christ  Jesus,  though  it  is  true 
Paul  does  not  raise  the  question  whether  the 
Christian's  own  apostasy  may  do  what  no  external 
enemy  can  do.  In  I  Corinthians  ix.  27,  where  Paul 
tells  us  of  his  life-and-death  struggle  with  his 
"  body,"  he  certainly  contemplates  the  possibility 
that  even  a  great  and  successful  preacher  like  himself 
may  not  be  found  genuine  at  the  judgment,  but  the 
question  of  the  possibility  of  a  second  repentance 
is  not  in  his  mind.  In  the  case  of  the  Corinthian 
Christian  who  was  guilty  of  incest,  Paul  apparently 
thinks  that  death  is  the  best  thing  that  can  happen 
to  him  physically,  but  he  does  not  despair  of  his 
ultimate  salvation  (1  Cor.  v.  4f.).  Christians  who 
desecrate  the  Lord's  table  suffer  illness  or  even 
death,  but  no  worse  fate  (1  Cor.  xi.  3off.). 

An  appeal  to  missionaries  of  to-day  for  their 
experience  on  the  point  would  doubtless  elicit 
various  answers.  One  has  known  a  convert  from 
Hinduism  who,  on  the  very  day  after  his  baptism, 
under  pressure  from  his  Hindu  relatives,  renounced 
his  profession  of  the  Christian  faith  and  went  back 
into   caste.     For   many   years   he   lived   in    caste  ; 

109 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

yet  he  attended  Church  regularly,  subscribed  to 
the  Church  funds,  and  found  his  friends  among 
Christians  ;  to  none  of  which  has  the  Hindu  any 
strenuous  objections  so  long  as  one  abides  by  the 
caste  regulations.  As  far  as  was  possible  within 
caste  restrictions  he  lived  the  Christian  life,  and 
finally,  in  another  part  of  the  country,  he  was  publicly 
received  back  into  the  Church.  In  spite  however 
of  solitary  examples  like  that,  perhaps  most  mission- 
aries would  agree  that  no  one  is  so  impervious  to 
spiritual  impulses  as  the  man  who  in  youth  was 
powerfully  attracted  by  the  Christian  appeal  but 
finally  said  "  No."  They  find  with  the  author 
of  i  John  that  there  is  a  degree  of  apostasy  so 
hopeless  as  to  render  even  prayer  nugatory  (v.  16). 

vi.  9-12 

This  section  concludes  with  a  parable  that  looks 
like  a  confused  reminiscence  of  the  parable  of  the 
tares  among  the  wheat.  It  leaves  us  with  the 
words  ringing  in  our  ears  that  announce  the  doom 
of  the  field  that  God  has  blessed,  if  it  gives  no 
return  :  "  rejected,"  "  accursed,"  "  destined  for 
the  fire."  The  pastor  will  not  and  cannot  con- 
template the  possibility  of  such  a  fate  for  his 
"  beloved  "  flock  (an  adjective  he  applies  to  them 
only  here  in  the  epistle).  Even  if  they  are  to  be 
judged  strictly  by  their  fruits,  they  need  not  go 
empty-handed  to  the  trial.  As  yet  the  author  only 
hints  at  the  services  which  right  up  till  the  present 

no 


An    Ancient    Creed 

his  readers  have  rendered  to  the  "  saints "  (a 
Pauline  term  for  Christians  which  he  here  employs 
contrary  to  his  usual  practice).  We  note  that,  as 
in  Paul's  letters,  we  are  still  at  the  stage  when  the 
Church  is  everywhere  a  small  body  fighting  with 
its  back  to  the  wall,  so  that  kindness  to  the  "saints  " 
is  an  even  more  urgent  duty  than  to  play  the 
Samaritan  to  the  "  outsiders." 

What  troubles  this  teacher  about  his  pupils  is 
not   any   failure   on    their   part   to   make   clear   on 
which  side  they  stand,  or  any  want  of  costly  loyalty 
to  their  fellow-Christians.     He  would  like  to  see 
them  more  anxious  about  themselves,  more  eager 
to  avoid  spiritual  slackness,  more  in  earnest  to  keep 
the  cup  of  their  Christian  hope  full  till  the  end. 
Nowadays  we  are  assured  on  all  hands  that  concern 
for  one's  own  salvation  is  out  of  date.     It  is  true 
that  there  is  a  kind  of  self-centred  interest  in  one's 
own  "  salvation  "  that  is  as  far  from  the  spirit  as 
from   the    practice   of  the   New   Testament.     Yet 
the  New  Testament  never  gets  so  far  out  of  touch 
with  life  as  we  sometimes  do  when  we  try  to  speak 
a  spiritual  language  that  we  have  learned  only  by 
rote.     Paul   never  hesitated   to   urge   his   converts 
to    the    most    serious    concern    about    their    own 
spiritual  welfare.     Some  of  Jesus'  most  memorable 
sayings  are  concerned  with  the   duty  of  sleepless 
vigilance,    and    would    be    pointless    if    our    own 
spiritual  danger  were  a  matter  of  no  moment  to 
us.     Parable  after  parable  of  Jesus  assumes  that 

in 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

the  individual  who  is  not  spiritually  blind  will  want 
not  only  that  the  world  should  find  God,  but  that 
he  himself  should  find  God.  The  call  is  not  that 
we  should  ignore  ourselves  but  that  we  should  lose 
ourselves,  and  even  then  the  goal  is  that  we  should 
find  ourselves. 

vi.  13-20 

The  author  will  assure  his  readers  that  if  they 
cannot  fully  trust  God  at  least  the  fault  is  not 
God's.  In  spite  of  the  handicap  of  his  method 
of  "  proof"  by  Alexandrian  Scripture  exegesis,  he 
contrives  to  make  an  effective  point.  How  do  we 
know  that  we  can  trust  God  ?  Among  men,  he 
replies,  an  oath  by  a  higher  power  is  an  absolute 
guarantee  of  fidelity.  There  is  no  higher  power 
than  God,  and  so  God  has  sworn  "  by  Himself"  ; 
which  means  that  there  are  ultimate  truths,  truths 
that  lie  in  the  very  nature  of  God  Himself  ;  though 
it  is  not  given  to  all  to  know  them.  The  pure  in 
heart  shall  see  the  purity  of  God,  and  the  faithful 
shall  know  God's  faithfulness. 

The  promise  to  which  God  bound  Himself  by 
an  oath  was  that  He  would  multiply  Abraham's 
seed  as  the  stars  and  as  the  sand  of  the  seashore. 
The  promise  had  been  given  at  the  moment  when 
Abraham  had  been  willing,  at  what  he  conceived 
to  be  the  command  of  God,  to  destroy  the  son, 
the  son  that  had  been  given  him  beyond  his  hopes, 
and  through  whom  alone,  as  it  seemed,  God's 
purpose  could  be  worked  out.     On  the  strength  of 

112 


An    Ancient    Creed 

this  assurance,  writer  and  readers  alike,  fleeing 
from  the  wrath  to  come,  fleeing  from  despair  and 
their  own  faithlessness,  may  with  stout  hearts  lay 
hold  of  the  Hope  set  before  them  ;  for  to  this 
writer  as  to  Paul  the  Christian  Faith  is  also  the 
Christian  hope,  the  Christian  certainty. 

We  have  an  anchor  of  the  soul  then — an  anchor 
that  will  "  neither  break  nor  drag."  *  This  anchor 
is  no  text  of  Scripture,  no  beautiful  phantasy  of 
some  pious  soul  in  the  long  ago.  Beneath  the 
strange  theory  of  inspiration  and  the  fanciful 
interpretation  of  Scripture,  we  have  in  this  passage 
a  piece  of  splendid  insight  and  faith.  The  author 
trusted  God,  not,  as  he  almost  tries  to  persuade 
himself,  on  account  of  some  "  vow "  God  was 
supposed  to  have  made  in  the  dim  past.  He 
trusted  God,  partly  because  he  saw  the  guiding 
hand  of  the  good  God  in  all  the  history  of  Israel  ; 
partly  because  in  Jesus  Christ  he  had  seen  God's 
radiant  glory  ;  because  also  his  intuition  told  him 
that  in  the  spread  of  the  Church  God's  ancient 
plan  was  working  itself  out  to  its  consummation. 
The  mustard  seed  was  springing  up  and  becoming 
a  great  plant  with  far-spreading  branches.  That 
was  the  magnificent  faith  that  inspired  this  writer 
and  many  like-minded  with  him  in  that  day, 
ludicrous  as  the  claim  must  have  seemed  to  the 
men  of  the  world,  to  those  of  them  indeed  who 
knew  or  thought  anything  of  the  matter. 

1  Weymouth's  translation. 

113  H 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

They  had  an  anchor  then  that  held  (vi.  19).  By 
a  curious  metaphor  the  anchor  is  represented  as 
going  behind  the  veil  that  hid  the  Holy  of  Holies  ; 
in  other  words  their  souls  were  anchored  to  the 
eternal  realities.  When  the  high  priest  went 
behind  the  veil  he  was  no  forerunner  ;  the  people 
were  forbidden  to  follow.  When  Jesus  opened  up 
for  us  the  way  to  God,  He  repeated  His  familiar 
call  :  "  Follow  me";  "  that  where  I  am  there 
ye  may  be  also."  He  was  no  Levite  but  a 
true  high  priest,  an  eternal  Melchizedec  high 
priest.  Thus  after  this  long  word  of  warning  and 
consolation,  by  the  adroit  reference  to  the  "  veil," 
the  writer  brings  us  back  to  the  point  he  had 
reached  in  v.  10.  He  is  now  ready  to  begin  in 
earnest  the  discussion  of  the  subject  he  has  had  in 
mind  all  through  :  the  Melchizedec  high-priesthood 
of  Jesus. 


114 


CHAPTER   X 

A  NEW  KIND  OF    PRIEST 
(vii.  1-28) 

The  author  has  now  reached  his  central  theme, 
the  high-priesthood  of  Jesus.  He  is  about  to  show 
that  Jesus'  offering  of  Himself  is  the  reality  of 
which  the  Old  Testament  sacrificial  ritual,  especially 
the  ceremonial  of  the  Day  of  Atonement,  was  only 
the  faint  foreshadowing.  We  expect  him  there- 
fore to  try  to  demonstrate  that  the  Aaronic  high 
priest  imperfectly  prefigured  Jesus.  This  however 
he  shrinks  from  doing  ;  for  reasons  which  we  can 
easily  understand. 

The  Old  Testament  speaks  with  two  voices  on 
the  subject  of  animal  sacrifice  and  its  validity. 
The  two  views  of  sacrifice,  which  seem  to  us 
irreconcileable,  are  admirably  represented  in  the 
closing  verses  in  Psalm  li.  In  verses  16  and  17 
we  read  :  "  For  thou  delightest  not  in  sacrifice  ; 
else  would  I  give  it  ;  thou  hast  no  pleasure  in 
burnt  offering.  The  sacrifices  of  God  are  a 
broken  spirit  ;  a  broken  and  a  contrite  heart,  O 
God,  thou  wilt  not  despise."  In  the  next  two 
verses  we  seem  to  be  in  another  atmosphere.  "  Do 
good  in  thy  good  pleasure  unto  Zion  ;    build  thou 

"5 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

the  walls  of  Jerusalem.  Then  shalt  thou  delight 
in  the  sacrifices  of  righteousness,  in  burnt  offering 
and  whole  burnt  offering  ;  then  shall  they  offer 
bullocks  on  thine  altar."  The  last  verse  at  least 
is  most  easily  explained  as  an  addition  by  one  who 
was  shocked  at  the  low  estimate  of  sacrifice  expressed 
in  the  previous  verses.  At  all  events  in  the  Old 
Testament  the  sacrificial  system  is  exalted  and 
revered  on  the  one  hand,  despised  and  ridiculed 
on  the  other. 

The  view  of  Scripture  held  by  the  author  of  this 
epistle  does  not  permit  him,  with  many  of  the 
finest  minds  in  Israel,  simply  to  regard  the  whole- 
sale religious  slaughter  of  animals  as  a  tragic  mis- 
understanding of  the  mind  of  God.  Superficially 
indeed  all  through  he  seems  to  be  finding  a  deep 
significance  in  the  sacrificial  ritual,  especially  that 
of  the  Day  of  Atonement.  Yet  the  nearest 
approach  he  makes  to  finding  in  it  any  real  efficacy 
is  his  grudging  admission  that  "  the  blood  of  goats 
and  bulls  and  the  ashes  of  a  heifer  sprinkled  on 
defiled  persons  sanctifies  to  the  extent  of  producing 
physical  (i.e.  ceremonial)  cleanness"  (ix.  13).  In 
the  same  sentence  this  ineffective  effectiveness  is 
set  in  the  strongest  contrast  with  the  power  of  the 
sacrifice  of  Christ  to  cleanse  the  conscience. 

All  the  author's  instincts  seem  to  lead  him, 
almost  unconsciously  to  himself,  to  sympathise 
with  the  prophetic  depreciation  rather  than  with 
the  priestly  exaltation  of  sacrifice  and  ritual.     For 

116 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

the  priests  he  has  not  a  good  word  to  say.  The 
section  in  which  he  deals  with  them  is  an  excellent 
illustration  of  the  effect  which  the  whole  "  weak 
and  useless  "  (vii.  18)  priestly  system  made  on  the 
minds  of  men  spiritually  sensitive.  The  priests 
were  appointed  by  a  law  that  dealt  only  with 
externals  (vii.  16)  ;  their  qualifications  were  purely 
physical  (vii.  14  ;  Neh.  vii.  63ft.)  ;  they  sinned 
like  the  rest  of  us  (vii.  27)  and  died  like  the  rest 
of  us  (vii.  23),  and  at  best  their  profession  had  an 
unpleasant  resemblance  to  that  of  a  butcher  (ix.  12). 
Using  the  Old  Testament  phraseology  so  con- 
vincing to  him  and  his  readers,  he  finds  two  other 
weaknesses  fatal  to  the  effectiveness  of  the  Levitical 
priests.  God  swore  no  oath  at  their  appointment 
(vii.  20)  (suggesting  apparently  that  God  did  not 
mean  their  appointment  to  be  taken  very  seriously), 
and  the  tabernacle  in  which  they  served  was  "  hand- 
made "  (ix.  11),  that  is,  their  whole  work  was 
concerned  with  physical  and  earthly  things,  not 
with  eternal  realities.  Whatever  we  think  of  the 
individual  counts  in  this  indictment  of  the  Levitical 
priesthood,  the  author  is  right  at  least  in  his  main 
contention.  If  ever  pious  souls  in  Israel  had 
sought  and  found  forgiveness  and  communion  with 
God,  as  many  of  them  did,  it  was  not  through  the 
medium  of  the  sacrificial  shambles.  The  priest- 
hood failed  when  tested  by  its  ability  to  perform 
the  function  of  all  priesthood.  It  could  not  quiet  | 
the    troubled    conscience    (ix.  9),    nor    secure    the 

117 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

approach  of  the  worshipper  to  God.  Far  from  the 
priest  being  able  to  say  :  "  Let  us  draw  near  to 
God,"  he  himself  was  allowed  to  enter  the  Holy 
of  Holies  only  once  a  year,  and  that  with  elaborate 
precautions  as  to  ritual  cleanness.  The  whole 
ceremonial  was  so  arranged  that  the  people  were 
made  to  feel  that  between  them  and  their  God 
there  was  a  great  gulf  fixed,  the  gulf  of  their  own 
sin,  which  nothing,  not  even  the  sacrifices  of  the 
Day  of  Atonement,  could  bridge. 

From  the  author's  point  of  view  the  Levitical 
high  priest  had  one  more  disability.  Lofty  as  his 
position  was,  yet  at  least  in  the  early  days  which  he 
has  chiefly  in  mind,  he  was  only  a  subordinate.  It 
is  true  that  in  Numbers  xxxiv.  17  and  Joshua  xiv.  1, 
the  high  priest  Eleazar  is  bracketed  with,  and  even 
takes  precedence  of,  the  prince  of  the  tribes,  Joshua 
the  son  of  Nun.  Still  the  priest  was  not  the  prince. 
While  the  priesthood  of  Jesus  is  central  in  this 
epistle,  it  does  not  follow  that  it  was  central  in  the 
mind  of  the  writer.  In  the  first  chapter  he  makes 
it  clear  that  the  priesthood  of  Jesus  is  only  one 
of  his  functions  ;  the  priest  is  also  king.  He  has 
sat  down  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty  on 
High  (i.  3)  and  His  throne  is  for  ever  (i.  8). 

If  we  ask  why  the  author  did  not  lay  more  stress 
on  the  kingship  of  Jesus,  this  is  only  part  of  the 
general  question  why  the  first  generations  of 
Christians  did  not  lay  more  stress  on  it.  That 
they  did  make  some  use  of  the  title  is  evident  from 

118 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

such  a  passage  as  Acts  xvii.  7,  where  Paul  and  his 
friends  are  accused  of  treason  on  the  ground  that 
they  acknowledge  another  king,  called  Jesus,  We 
must  not  dismiss  too  lightly  the  suggestion  that 
it  was  fear  of  this  very  treason  charge  that  led  the 
early  Christians  to  be  chary  of  emphasising  the 
kingship  of  Jesus.  The  claim  to  be  "  King  of  the 
Jews  "  was  the  effective  charge  on  which  Jesus 
was  condemned. 

Nor  need  we  accuse  the  Christians  of  any  degree 
of  cowardice  or  even  of  excessive  prudence  if  this 
was  the  restraining  motive.  It  may  not  be  quite 
true  to  say  that  Jesus  died  for  a  metaphor  ;  yet 
every  Christian  recognised  that,  though  Jesus  was 
king,  His  kingdom  was  not  of  this  world.  Never- 
theless everyone  who  became  a  follower  of  Jesus 
had  thenceforth  a  double  loyalty,  as  the  heads  of 
the  Jewish  Church  learnt  when  they  sought  to 
compel  the  Christians  absolutely  to  refrain  from 
speaking  or  teaching  in  the  name  of  Jesus  (Acts  iv. 
1 8),  as  the  Roman  Government  was  to  learn  later 
when  they  tried  to  make  the  Christians  worship 
the  emperor. 

In  his  study  of  the  sacrificial  system  the  author 
makes  no  enquiry  such  as  a  modern  writer  would 
make  into  the  primitive  ideas  that  underlie  the 
strange  supposition  that  the  slaughter  of  unwilling 
and  inoffensive  animals  somehow  affected  man's 
relation  to  God.  It  was  enough  for  him  that  the 
sacrificial  system  was  ordained  in  Scripture.     The 

119 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

marvel  is  that,  believing,  as  his  theory  of  Scripture 
compelled  him  to  believe,  that  God  was  in  some 
way  responsible  for  the  institution  of  animal  sacri- 
fice, he  yet  saw  so  clearly  the  ineffectiveness  of  the 
system  ;  and  that,  obliged  as  he  thought  he  was  to 
interpret  the  death  of  Christ  through  the  category 
of  animal  sacrifice,  he  yet  reached  so  lofty  and 
spiritual  a  conception  of  the  meaning  of  that  death, 
and  in  such  large  measure  escaped  the  degrading 
theories  of  the  Atonement  which  in  the  minds  of 
multitudes  have  distorted  the  picture  of  the  God,  who 
is  the  Father  of  our  Lord  and  Saviour  Jesus  Christ. 
There  may  well  have  been  another  reason  why 
the  author  hesitated  to  find  in  the  Levitical  high 
priest  a  prototype  of  Jesus.  "  In  the  days  of  His 
flesh  "  Jesus  had  come  in  contact  with  the  priests 
of  His  time  and  had  said  His  say  about  them.  It 
must  have  been  with  the  connivance  of  the  priests 
that  the  temple  had  been  turned  into  a  bird-  and 
cattle-market  ;  and  in  a  scene  which  may  well 
have  contributed  forcibly  to  the  final  tragedy  Jesus 
in  true  prophetic  vein  denounced  the  sacrilege. 
A  priest  and  a  Levite  had  been  pilloried  for  all 
time  in  a  parable  which  is  with  one  exception  the 
most  gracious  of  all  the  parables  of  Jesus.  If  the 
priests  had  not  greatly  interfered  with  Jesus  in  the 
earlier  days  of  His  ministry,  they  had  played  a 
decisive  part  in  its  closing  days  ;  and  after  His 
death,  as  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  tells  us,  the 
persecution  of  His  followers  was  largely  conducted, 

120 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

or  inspired  and  directed,  by  the  priests.  It  would 
only  be  human  nature  if  a  Christian  of  the  first 
century  found  the  priesthood  a  counterfoil  to, 
rather  than  a  parabolic  foreshadowing  of,  Jesus. 

We  see  the  author  then,  anxious  to  exhibit 
Jesus  as  the  great  high  priest,  necessitated  by  his 
view  of  Scripture  to  find  in  the  Old  Testament  an 
analogue  for  the  high-priesthood  of  Jesus,  yet 
repelled  by  the  idea  that  the  official  priests  of  the 
chosen  people  were  in  any  sense  forerunners  of 
Jesus.  It  was  not  the  first  time  in  Jewish  history 
a  somewhat  similar  problem  had  arisen.  There 
was  a  memorable  precedent  in  the  days  of  the 
Maccabees.  Jonathan  had  greatly  strengthened 
his  position  as  leader  of  the  Jews  by  his  appoint- 
ment as  high  priest,  which  he  received  in  152  B.C. 
from  the  Syrian  prince  Alexander  Balas  ;  but  the 
first  of  the  Maccabees  to  be  made  high  priest  with 
the  sanction  of  his  own  countrymen  was  Jonathan's 
brother  Simon.  At  an  assembly  held  in  141  b.c 
he  was  formally  recognised  as  holder  of  the  combined 
offices  of  Prince  and  High  Priest. 

But  how  could  one  who  was  not  of  the  house  of 
David  be  prince,  and  how  could  one  who  was  not 
of  the  house  of  Eleazar  be  high  priest  ?  The 
mysterious  Melchizedec  (Gen.  xiv.  i8fF.),  king  of 
Salem,  priest  of  the  Most  High  God,  who  came 
none  knew  whence  and  went  none  knew  whither, 
seemed  to  provide  a  heaven-sent  precedent,  as  the 
story  of  one  who  was  neither  of  royal  nor  priestly 

121 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

lineage,  and  yet  was  both  king  and  priest.  Accord- 
ing to  a  tempting  suggestion  Psalm  ex.  was  com- 
posed at  this  time  in  the  form  of  a  divine  oracle 
by  an  enthusiastic  supporter  of  the  Maccabees, 
who  was  convinced  that  Simon  was  the  God- 
appointed  king  and  priest  of  the  Jews.  (The 
credit  for  discovering  that  the  initial  letters  of 
the  lines  beginning  "  Sit  thou  "  form  an  acrostic  on 
the  word  Simon  has  been  ascribed  to  Bickell.) 

The  way  was  thus  opened  for  the  writer  "  to 
the  Hebrews,"  and  he  makes  full  use  of  the 
Melchizedec  story  in  "  Genesis  "  and  of  the  oracle 
based  on  it  in  Psalm  ex.  Philo  and  the  later 
Jewish  literature  refer  to  Melchizedec,  and  we 
need  not  suppose  that  the  fascination  of  this 
mysterious  personage  was  first  felt  in  the  age  of 
the  Maccabees  ;  but  the  use  made  of  it  by  the 
author  of  "  Hebrews  "  seems  to  be  all  his  own, 
and  apparently  he  alone  suggested  that  Melchizedec 
was  superior  to  Abraham.  We  note  also  that,  as 
soon  as  he  has  scored  his  point  of  showing  that  the 
Levitical  priesthood  was  a  pitiful  substitute  for  the 
true  priesthood  typified  in  Melchizedec,  he  makes 
no  further  reference  to  this  figure,  whose  impres- 
siveness  is  so  largely  due  to  the  mists  that  hide  him 
from  us. 

vii.   i,  2 

Rendel  Harris  seems  to  have  established  that 
the  early  Christians  used  an  "  onomastikon,',  that 
is,  a  book  giving  the  interpretation  of  names.     The 

122 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

author  finds  the  significance  of  Melchizedec  the 
priest  king  in  the  first  place  in  his  names. 
Melchizedec  he  interprets  as  "  king  of  righteous- 
ness "  (Peake  thinks  the  name  really  meant  "  My 
Lord  is  Sidiq,"  the  latter  being  the  name  of  a  deity). 
"  Salem  "  he  translates  "  Peace."  Thus  for  him 
Melchizedec  embodied  two  of  the  qualities  most 
closely  associated  in  prophecy  with  the  Messianic 
kingdom,  righteousness  and  peace.  "  His  name 
shall  be  called  .  .  .  Prince  of  Peace  ...  to  up- 
hold "  the  kingdom  of  David  "  with  righteousness  " 
(Isa.  ix.  6,  7).  "  The  kingdom  of  God  is  right- 
eousness and  peace  ..."  (Rom.  xiv.  17).  The 
title  "  Most  High  God "  also,  being  frequently 
used  by  Gentiles  (cf.  Acts  xvi.  17),  may  have  been 
intended  to  suggest  that  this  priest-king  did  not 
belong  to  Abraham's  race  at  all. 

vii.  3 

Then  we  have  a  piece  of  true  Alexandrian  exegesis. 
In  the  Genesis  story  nothing  is  said  of  Melchizedec's 
father,  mother,  genealogy,  birth,  or  death  ;  there- 
fore he  had  no  father,  mother,  or  genealogy,  was 
not  born  and  did  not  die,  but  was  made  like  the 
(eternal)  Son  of  God.  Thus  the  author  reaches 
one  of  his  main  points  :  the  Melchizedec  priest- 
hood is  an  abiding  priesthood,  not  circumscribed 
by  birth  and  death. 

At  first  sight  it  is  a  little  difficult  to  know  just 
what   to   make   of  all    this.     It   was    natural    that 

123 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

Jewish  readers  should  be  puzzled  by  the  intro- 
duction, without  hint  of  his  parentage  or  ancestry, 
of  a  character  so  strange  as  Melchizedec,  in  a 
book  so  interested  in  genealogies  as  "  Genesis." 
Apparently  Genesis  xiv.  does  not  belong  to  the 
priestly  document  which  revels  in  genealogical  in- 
formation, but  this  author  could  not  be  expected  to 
be  aware  of  that.  He  himself  seems  to  suggest  that 
his  account  is  not  to  be  taken  too  literally  ;  for 
when  he  says  that  Melchizedec  abides  a  priest 
permanently,  he  can  hardly  mean  that  he  has  a 
permanent  priesthood  alongside  that  of  Jesus.  Is 
not  the  truth  that  we  are  here  in  contact  with  a 
species  of  literature,  once  familiar  and  intelligible 
enough,  but  now  difficult  to  understand  because 
we  no  longer  write  in  that  way  ?  The  ethics  of 
the  novel,  a  form  of  literature  in  which  imaginary 
events  are  described  without  intent  to  deceive,  the 
value  of  which  is  even  judged  by  its  fidelity  to 
"  truth,"  has  been  equally  puzzling  to  many  in 
our  own  day. 

vii.  4-10 

The  author  makes  yet  other  claims  for  Melchize- 
dec. He  and  not  Abraham  is  the  fountain-head 
of  the  grace  and  power  of  the  Jewish  race. 
Authority  over  a  people  is  shown  in  two  ways  : 
the  privilege  of  blessing,  the  power  of  taxation. 
In  the  Melchizedec  story  it  was  Melchizedec  who 
blessed  Abraham,  that  too  at  the  one  moment  in 
the  history  of  Abraham  when  he  appeared  in  the 

124 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

guise  of  a  military  conqueror.  Further,  the  right  of 
taxation,  or  of  exacting  tithes,  was  the  prerogative 
of  the  Levites.  But  Abraham  paid  tithes  to 
Melchizedec,  and  that  not  at  the  behest  of  any 
law  but  of  his  own  free  will.  Thus  "  in  a  sense  " 
(vii.  9  ;  a  hint  that  the  sentence  must  be  read  in 
the  figurative  sense  in  which  it  is  written)  Abraham's 
unborn  descendant  Levi  and  all  his  tribe  paid  tithes 
to  Melchizedec.  The  Jews  acknowledged  Abraham 
as  their  father  ;  Abraham  acknowledged  Melchize- 
dec as  his  priest  and  king  ;  and  Melchizedec's 
authority  lay  only  in  his  obvious  and  acknowledged 
personal  dignity. 

vii.  11-28 

• 

The  Levitical  priesthood  then  was  a  degenerate 
usurper.  As  Psalm  ex.  declared,  the  true  priest  is 
of  the  type  of  Melchizedec.  But  in  the  new  order 
far  more  is  involved  than  a  mere  change  of  priest. 
The  character  of  the  priesthood  determines  the 
whole  legal  economy  of  the  nation,  or  as  we  should 
say,  the  institutions  of  society  rest  ultimately  on 
a  religious  basis.  A  people  cannot  change  its 
religion  without  the  change  reverberating  through 
every  department  of  its  life — legal,  political,  educa- 
tional, industrial,  and  social.  The  point  is  of  great 
interest  at  the  present  moment  in  connection  with 
the  charge  of  "  denationalisation  "  so  often  brought 
against  Christian  missions.  The  accusation  is 
often  denied  by  missionaries,  perhaps  with  some 
justification   so   long   as   the   controversy   concerns 

125 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

more  or  less  superficial  habits  in  food,  clothing, 
and  manners.  It  is  best  to  acknowledge  frankly 
that  Christianity  has  failed  in  so  far  as  it  has  not 
transformed  the  national  life  of  every  people  it 
touches. 

In  spite,  then,  of  the  apparent  remoteness  from 
us  both  of  his  points  and  of  his  arguments,  this 
writer  is  dealing  with  problems  of  living  interest, 
dealing  with  them  far  more  effectively  than  might 
at  first  sight  appear.  By  ways  that  seem  to  us 
tortuous  he  has  reached  the  truth  emphasised  by 
Jesus  and  by  Paul,  so  familiar  to  us  now  however 
little  we  may  apply  it  in  our  lives,  but  once  so 
revolutionary.  In  the  spiritual  world  we  do  not 
count  descent  from  father  to  son  ;  he  is  a  true 
Jew  who  is  one  inwardly.  The  only  "  order " 
that  is  "  valid  "  in  God's  sight  is  the  "  order  "  of 
the  pure  in  heart.  For  the  Christian  priesthood 
the  qualifications  are  God's  call,  victorious  goodness 
and  helpful  sympathy.  In  the  things  of  the  spirit 
there  is  no  kingship  but  that  which  wins  our 
spontaneous  loyalty,  no  priesthood  but  that  which 
even  an  Abraham  will  instinctively  acknowledge  ; 
and  apostolical  succession  is  not  from  hand  to  head 
but  from  spirit  to  spirit. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  the  treatment  of  the 
Law  by  this  writer,  by  the  apostle  Paul,  and  by 
our  Lord.  All  three  find  it  "  weak  and  ineffective  "  : 
Paul,  because  of  man's  incurable  tendency  to  break 
the  law  ;   this  writer  because  of  the  proved  inability 

126 


A  New  Kind  of  Priest 

of  the  Law  to  discharge  any  of  the  obligations  laid 
upon  it.  In  criticising  the  Law  our  Lord  used 
none  of  the  laboured  arguments  of  either  writer. 
He  drew  a  lightning  sketch,  a  grimly  humorous 
caricature  of  a  Pharisee  at  prayer.  There  for  all 
time  are  graphically  depicted  the  "  weakness  and 
ineffectiveness  "  of  a  legal  system  of  righteousness. 

Like  so  much  of  the  New  Testament  this  chapter 
is  a  tribute  to  the  overwhelming  impression  made 
by  Jesus  on  the  first  generations  of  Christians.  It 
is  not  the  conclusion  of  a  process  of  theological 
reasoning,  nor  is  it  the  repetition  of  a  stereotyped 
formula,  but  the  outpouring  of  a  great  heart,  of 
one  who  has  experienced  the  glad  deliverance  and 
felt  the  new  power.  Through  the  unfamiliar 
processes  of  the  argument  one  can  feel  the  author's 
joy  that  Jesus  is  king  and  priest  after  the  order  of 
Melchizedec,  one  whose  ministry  is  not  subject  to 
the  changes  and  chances,  rather  the  fatal  certainties 
of  our  mortal  lives,  one  who  has  become  our  high 
priest  by  no  legal  appointment  but  by  the  power 
of  His  own  indissoluble  life. 

There  is  one  sentence  here  in  which  every  phrase 
is  a  sermon.  "  Since  none  can  displace  Him,  He 
is  able,  to  save  indeed,  without  limit,  those  who 
approach  God,  through  Him,  since  He  lives,  for 
ever,  to  intercede  for  them  "  (vii.  25).  Whatever 
else  His  intercession  for  them  means,  it  removes 
all  that  hinders  their  approach  to  God. 


127 


CHAPTER   XI 

IN   THE  SPIRIT  OF  THE  ETERNAL 
(viii.  i-ix.  28) 

viii.  1-5 

The  argument  is  now  advanced  a  stage.  "  Now 
to  crown  our  present  discourse,"  as  the  opening 
phrase  of  chapter  viii.  has  been  translated.  The 
author  has  shown  that  our  high  priest  does  not 
stand  as  the  Levitical  priest  stood  at  his  daily  work. 
He  has  sat  down  as  one  whose  work  is  finished, 
sat  down  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Majesty  on  High 
as  one  who  is  king  as  well  as  priest.  Now  every 
priest  must  have  a  sanctuary.  The  sanctuary  of 
our  high  priest  is  no  earthly  symbolic  tabernacle, 
but  the  real  heavenly  tabernacle  ;  no  man-made 
imitation  but  the  handiwork  of  God.  We  are  here 
in  the  realm  of  ideas  current  in  Alexandrian  Juda- 
ism, based  on  the  Platonic  philosophy,  and  suggested 
in  the  phrase  that  this  writer  quotes  from  God's 
instructions  to  Moses  (Exod.  xxv.  40)  :  "  See  that 
thou  make  all  things  according  to  the  pattern  shown 
thee  on  the  mount."  The  things  of  our  daily 
lives  are  fleeting,  imperfect,  unsatisfying  ;  but  they 
are  only  shadowy  copies  of  the  real  things  which  eye 

128 


In  the    Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

has  not  seen  nor  ear  heard.  Our  best  endeavours 
in  any  line  are  but  attempts  to  recapture  the 
vision  that  God  has  tried  to  give  us.  On  this 
philosophy  all  the  appurtenances  of  worship  were 
feeble  imitations  of  the  realities  in  the  mind  of 
God,  which  hitherto  have  been  known  only  to  God 
but  now  are  revealed  in  Jesus.  His  ministry  is 
conducted  in  the  true  sanctuary,  in  the  presence 
of  God. 

A  priest  further  must  have  something  to  offer  ; 
but  the  author  will  return  to  this  subject,  which 
he  has  already  touched  (vii.  27).  Incidentally  he 
makes  the  suggestive  remark  that  if  Jesus  were  on 
earth  He  would  not  be  a  priest  at  all.  The  priests 
had  in  fact  made  it  clear  that  in  their  judgment  there 
was  no  place  for  Him  on  earth,  much  less  in  their 
own  number. 

viii.  6-n 

Now  the  author  approaches  his  new  point. 
God  had  arranged  a  rest  for  His  people  :  they 
failed  to  enter  in,  but  the  rest  remains  ;  He  gives 
them  another  day.  The  Levitical  priesthood  has 
been  playing  with  shadows  ;  God  has  given  us  a 
new  priest,  a  priest  who  deals  with  realities.  The 
Sinai  covenant  has  broken  down  ;  it  imposed  on 
us  laws  which,  constituted  as  we  are,  we  could  not 
keep  :    God  is  giving  us  a  new  covenant. 

The  New  Covenant  is  a  phrase  which  this 
writer  borrows  from  "  Jeremiah,"  and  in  using  which 
he  shows  prophetic  instinct.    When  the  commonly 

129  1 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

recognised  Christian  Scriptures  came  to  be  regarded 
as  a  unity,  and  a  name  was  required  for  the 
collection,  the  phrase  adopted  by  common  consent 
was  the  New  Covenant,  or,  in  the  form  better 
known  to  us  through  the  influence  of  Latin  trans- 
lations, the  New  Testament.  Already  in  the  sixth 
decade  of  the  first  century  Paul  could  speak  to 
the  Corinthians  of  the  Old  Covenant  (Testament) 
(2  Cor.  iii.  14).  Long  before  this  the  phrase 
"  the  New  Covenant  "  had  already  the  most  sacred 
associations  for  Christians.  At  the  Last  Supper 
Jesus  had  said  :  "  This  is  my  covenant  blood," 
and  according  to  the  accounts  in  Luke's  Gospel 
and  in  1  Corinthians  had  used  the  very  words  "  the 
New  Covenant." 

The  author's  special  interest  in  the  "Jeremiah" 
quotation  is  in  its  concluding  reference  to  the 
forgiveness  of  sins  (Heb.  x.  I7f.)  ;  yet  it  is  hardly 
credible  that  he  quotes  the  whole  passage  simply 
for  the  sake  of  its  final  words.  Rather  in  the 
extended  quotation  we  seem  to  see  the  author 
stretching  out  his  hands  across  the  ages  to  a  kindred 
spirit,  to  one  who  had  as  little  interest  as  himself 
in  the  sacramental  emblems,  who  had  pioneered  on 
the  road  to  the  great  conception  of  the  individual's 
unhindered  access  to  God. 

In  Josiah's  time  a  law  book  (presumably  some 
shorter  form  of  our  "  Deuteronomy ")  had  been 
found  in  the  temple.  For  a  time  the  enthusiasm 
created   by  the  discovery  of  this   "  message  from 

130 


In  the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

God  "  created  a  kind  of  reformation.  Soon  how- 
ever it  became  clear  that  no  code  of  laws,  whether 
the  few  simple  precepts  of  an  earlier  age  cut  in 
stone  or  laws  in  the  more  elaborate,  reasoned  and 
hortatory  form  that  we  find  in  "  Deuteronomy," 
could  change  the  human  heart.  With  that  fatal 
tendency  to  circumscribe  God  that  seems  to  be 
part  of  the  human  heritage,  the  people  listened  to 
those  who  repeated  the  parrot-cry  :  "  The  Temple 
of  Jehovah,"  "  The  Temple  of  Jehovah  "  (Jer.  vii.  4), 
and  taught  them  that  there  was  salvation  in  stone 
and  lime  however  foul  their  lives.  They  thought 
their  mere  possession  of  the  written  law  of  Jehovah 
was  a  passport  to  God's  favour  (Jer.  viii.  8). 

It  was  then  that  Jeremiah  was  inspired  to  one 
of  the  loftiest  flights  of  pre-Christian  prophecy 
(xxxi.  31—34).  Even  the  Old  Covenant,  he  re- 
minded his  people,  was  a  covenant  of  grace.  It 
commemorated  the  day  when  God  took  Israel  by 
the  hand,  as  a  father  takes  the  hand  of  his  little 
child,  to  lead  him  out  of  Egypt.  The  covenant 
failed  ;  the  Israelites  were  disobedient  to  it.  Yet 
Jeremiah  suggests,  and  the  writer  to  the  "Hebrews  " 
frankly  says  (viii.  7),  that  the  fault  was  not  alto- 
gether with  the  people  ;  it  was,  in  part  at  least, 
with  the  covenant,  with  the  whole  conception  of 
morality  as  obedience  to  a  written  law.  God,  so 
to  speak,  promotes  His  backward  pupils  to  a 
higher  class  in  their  moral  and  spiritual  education. 
They  are  now  to  be  transferred  from  the  sphere 

131 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

where  obedience  means  unintelligent  or  reluctant 
yielding  to  "  Do  this,"  "  Do  not  do  that,"  to  the 
sphere  where  it  means  the  glad  response  of  one's 
whole  being  to  the  will  of  God,  which  we  recognise 
as  seeking  our  welfare. 

It  is  true  that  when  we  examine  Jeremiah's 
oracle  he  seems  at  first  sight  to  proclaim  no  new 
kind  of  religion,  nor  even  of  law  ;  only  that  the 
old  laws,  instead  of  being  written  on  stone  tablets 
or  on  any  scroll,  shall  be  written  on  the  human 
heart.  It  has  even  been  suggested  that  the  passage 
was  not  written  by  Jeremiah  at  all  but  by  some 
law  enthusiast  whose  ideal  it  was  that  every  man 
should  know  the  law  by  heart.  We  may  indeed 
freely  grant  that,  even  with  all  the  prophetic  insight 
revealed  in  this  passage,  Jeremiah  is  groping  for 
the  light  rather  than  rejoicing  in  it.  He  has  not 
yet  realised  that  the  trouble  lies  deeper  than  in 
our  conception  of  law.  So  long  as  we  think  of 
God  as  our  law-giver  at  all,  so  long  will  our  response 
to  God  be  lacking  in  spontaneity.  Only  when  we 
enter  into  our  inheritance  as  sons  of  God,  and  come 
to  Him  as  children  to  a  Father,  shall  we  enjoy  that 
liberty  in  God  that  only  sons  can  know. 

We  note  too  in  Jeremiah's  oracle  the  failure  to 
recognise  that  it  is  not  enough  to  know  the  will 
of  God  ;  he  was  feeling  after  an  experience  that 
the  first  generation  of  Christians  was  to  know  in 
such  rich  abundance,  the  new  spiritual  capacity 
that  comes  from  the  striking  off  of  the  shackles, 

132 


In   the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

what  the  apostle  Paul  calls  "  power."  The  word 
"  covenant "  in  fact  imperfectly  expresses  what 
both  writers  have  in  mind.  It  is  not  a  bargain 
between  two  parties  on  equal  terms.  In  this 
covenant  the  gracious  God  is  making  an  approach 
to  men,  seeking  to  win  them  to  Himself  ;  yet  it 
is  two-sided  at  least  in  this  sense,  that  if  God  is  to 
be  our  God  we  must  be  His  people. 

Further,  in  the  last  resort,  every  man  must  seek 
and  find  God  for  himself.  Prophet,  priest,  and 
teacher  ;  temple,  ritual,  and  sacrament  ;  these  may 
all  have  a  part  to  play  in  religious  education  ;  yet 
the  help  that  any  man  or  any  institution  can  give 
us  in  our  spiritual  lives  is  strictly  limited.  In 
particular  the  priest  whose  function  it  is  to  bring 
us  to  God  too  often  becomes  an  obstacle  that 
blocks  our  pathway  to  God.  If  we  are  correct  in 
our  interpretation  of  the  mind  of  the  writer  "  to 
the  Hebrews,"  this  part  of  Jeremiah's  oracle  must 
have  made  a  special  appeal  to  him.  He  leaves  us 
to  draw  our  own  inferences  ;  but  for  those  who 
have  followed  his  exposition  of  the  high-priesthood 
of  Jesus,  a  human  Christian  priest  is  a  contradiction 
in  terms.  "  Teachers  "  and  "  leaders  "  we  have 
and  need  ;  but  the  priest  who  professes  to 
represent  us  before  God,  or  to  mediate  God's 
forgiveness  to  us,  is  trying  to  undo  what  Jesus 
did  so  effectively  once  for  all  ;  is  taking  us 
back  to  the  old  feeble  and  useless  Levitical 
priesthood. 

*33 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

viii.  12,   13 

The  closing  words  of  the  oracle  fit  exactly  into 
the  thought  of  this  author.  If  man  is  ever  to  have 
fellowship  with  God  it  can  never  be  on  the  basis 
that  he  keeps  God's  law  ;  but  only  because  God, 
knowing  our  frailty,  is  willing  to  forgive.  As 
Jesus  put  it  long  afterwards,  it  is  the  rebellion  in 
the  son's  heart  that  drives  him  away  from  the 
Father.  When  the  rebel  heart  is  broken  and 
repentant,  the  Father's  arms  are  waiting,  the  door 
of  the  home  is  open  wide.  Well  may  this  author 
say  that  from  the  days  of  Jeremiah  the  days  of  the 
Old  Covenant  are  numbered. 

ix.  1-28 

The  author  now  elaborates  a  comparison  and 
contrast  between  the  two  covenants,  the  sanctuary  of 
the  Old  and  the  sanctuary  of  the  New,  the  priest 
of  the  Old  and  the  priest  of  the  New,  the  ritual 
too  of  the  two  covenants  (ix.  1—5).  In  describing 
the  furniture  of  the  tabernacle  it  may  be  that  the 
author  displays  a  certain  impatience  with  the  dreary 
catalogue,  "  about  which  I  cannot  at  present  speak 
in  detail "  (ix.  5).  Probably  however,  as  we  should 
expect  in  so  careful  a  document,  each  item  has 
its  significance  ;  the  manna  for  example  being  a 
reminder  of  the  faithlessness  of  the  Israelites  and 
the  kindly  way  in  which  God  dealt  with  it  ;  Aaron's 
Rod  recalling  the  Divine  choice  that  expressly 
reserved  Divine  prerogatives  for  the  tribe  of  Levi, 

*34 


In   the   Spirit  of  the   Eternal 

and  the  small  winged  things  that  represented  the 
Divine  presence,  the  Cherubim  of  the  Glory,  form- 
ing a  striking  foil  to  the  Glory  known  to  this 
writer  and  his  friends  as  representing  the  Majesty 
on  High. 

One  of  his  points  he  makes  by  taking  advantage 
of  the  ambiguity  of  the  Greek  word  "  diatheke." 
By  this  word  he  usually  means  "  covenant,"  but 
in  ix.  1 6,  17  he  uses  it  in  the  sense  of  "  will  "  or 
11  testament,"  thus  being  enabled  to  associate  the 
death  of  Jesus  with  the  inauguration  of  the  new 
era.  For  this  idea  he  had  the  authority  of  Jesus 
Himself,  who,  as  reported  by  Luke,  had  said  : 
"  As  my  Father  bequeathed  to  me  a  kingdom,  so 
I  bequeath  to  you  to  eat  and  drink  at  my  table 
in  my  kingdom  "  (xxii.  30),  where  the  word  for 
"  bequeath  "  is  the  verb  of  this  noun  "  diatheke." 

In  the  last  two  verses  of  chapter  ix.  the  author 
completes  in  a  striking  way  the  contrast  between 
the  two  rituals  (ix.  27f.).  Perhaps  the  expectation 
of  a  speedy  return  of  Jesus  hardly  harmonises  with 
his  general  outlook,  but  it  was  part  of  the  common 
heritage  of  the  Church.  In  the  days  of  the  Old 
Covenant,  when  the  high  priest  entered  the  Holy 
of  Holies  the  people  waited  with  eager  expectation 
till  the  veil  parted  once  more  and  he  emerged  ; 
symbol  to  the  people  that  their  covenant  with  God 
still  stood  and  that  such  forgiveness  as  the  ritual 
could  bestow  for  the  sins  of  the  past  year  was 
theirs.     Yet   it   was   a  very   chastened   satisfaction 

i35 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

that  they  found  ;    they  knew  it  would  all  have  to 
be  done  again  and  again  through  countless  years. 

When  Jesus  entered  the  Most  Holy  Place  He 
entered  for  the  first  and  the  last  time.  His  death 
could  not  be  repeated  and  need  not  be  repeated. 
His  people  wait  for  His  return  as  the  Israelites 
waited  for  the  return  of  their  high  priest  ;  and 
some  day  He  will  come,  not  for  judgment  but 
bringing  salvation  to  His  waiting  people.  He 
came  the  first  time  to  put  away  sin  by  the  sacrifice 
of  Himself  (ix.  26)  ;  He  will  come  the  second 
time  with  no  reference  to  sin  (ix.  28).  That 
chapter  of  His  history  is  ended. 

Throughout  this  chapter  (ix.)  once  more  we  find 
the  author  struggling  to  express  what  Jesus  has 
been  to  him  and  to  those  who  have  passed  through 
an  experience  like  this  ;  perhaps  on  the  whole 
limited  by  the  compulsion  he  feels  to  find  in  the 
Levitical  ritual  the  categories  with  which  to  for- 
mulate his  experience  ;  yet  using  this  ritual  as  an 
admirable  counterfoil  to  the  work  of  Jesus,  which 
he  expounds  with  great  power,  and  in  language 
which  has  become,  to  use  his  own  phrase,  part  of 
the  "  undying  heritage  "  of  the  Church. 

In  setting  forth  what  Jesus  had  been  to  himself 
and  his  friends,  perhaps  like  Paul  he  was  straitened 
by  the  attitude  of  Jesus  to  the  Jewish  Law.  In 
effect  Jesus  dealt  the  Torah  its  death-blow.  If 
any  part  of  it  passed  over  into  the  Christian  Church 
it   was   not   because   it   was   found   written   in   the 

136 


In  the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

Old  Testament,  but  because  it  was  part  of  the 
universal  Law  that  God  has  engraven  on  the  hearts 
of  men.  But  Jesus  seems  never  to  have  directly 
attacked  the  Law  ;  He  went  to  work  in  another 
way.  By  carrying  the  attention  back  from  act  to 
motive  and  from  conduct  to  the  hidden  life  ;  by 
distinguishing  between  ritual  and  moral  while 
treating  even  the  ritual  with  respect ;  by  recognising 
that  the  Written  Law  contained  temporary  con- 
cessions to  the  grim  facts  of  human  nature,  and 
finally,  by  treating  the  whole  Torah  as  but  a  stage 
in  the  spiritual  education  of  the  race,  Jesus  in  fact 
undermined  the  whole  system. 

Yet  it  was  all  done  so  quietly  and  so  implicitly 
that  it  was  possible  for  the  less  penetrating  to 
maintain  that  it  had  not  been  done  at  all.  Even 
in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  as  we  have  it,  after 
the  genuine  and  characteristic  word  of  Jesus, 
"  I  have  not  come  to  destroy  but  to  fulfil,"  there 
is  the  solemn  assertion  :  "  For  verily  I  tell  you, 
till  heaven  and  earth  pass,  no  dot  of  an  /  or  stroke 
of  a  /  shall  pass  from  the  Law  till  all  be  fulfilled." 
Surely  Jesus  never  said  that,  yet  it  was  possible 
for  the  sentence  to  get  into  the  record.  Paul  felt 
he  had  been  slain  by  the  Law,  yet  the  command- 
ment was  "  holy,  and  righteous,  and  beneficent." 
He  never  seems  fully  to  have  appreciated  the 
distinction  that  seems  to  us  so  obvious  between 
ritual  and  moral.  For  the  Christian  the  Law,  the 
whole  system,  had  come  to  an  end  on  the  Cross. 

i37 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

"  Everything  is  now  allowable."  But  Paul  soon 
learnt  that  this  is  a  dangerous  doctrine  to  preach 
among  uninstructed  people  with  fierce  passions. 
He  had  in  fact  soon  to  begin  building  up  what 
seems  singularly  like  a  new  Law,  albeit  a  Law  that 
leaves  a  large  place  for  individual  liberty  guided 
by  Christian  love. 

Speaking  generally,  when  Paul  spoke  of  the  Law 
he  had  in  mind  the  ethical  parts  of  the  system. 
That  left  the  very  extensive  ritual  requirements 
untouched.  One  of  the  striking  things  in  the 
Gospels  is  the  almost  complete  absence  of  any 
reference,  hostile  or  otherwise,  to  the  sacrificial 
system.  It  is  incredible  that  Jesus  can  have  felt 
any  sympathy  with  the  type  of  piety  that  expressed 
itself  in  the  slaughter  of  animals  ;  but  for  what- 
ever reason  He  does  not  seem  to  have  been  brought 
into  open  conflict  with  the  system.  This  may  be 
in  part  due  to  the  fact  that  the  sacrifices  were 
offered  only  in  the  temple  and  consequently  played 
no  part  in  the  ordinary  life  of  Galilee.  It  is  at 
least  striking  that  the  sacrificial  system  is  not  a 
count  in  the  terrible  indictment  of  external  religion 
in  Matthew  xxiii.,  and  that  at  the  "cleansing"  of 
the  Temple  it  was  the  arrangement  for  the  sale  of 
the  animals,  not  the  fact  of  their  slaughter,  that 
Jesus  attacked. 

Again,  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  while 
emphasising  that  God  looks  not  at  the  gift  but  at 
the   giver,   Jesus   seems   at   least   to   speak   of  the 

138 


In  the   Spirit  of  the   Eternal 

sacrificial  system  without  disparagement  (Matt.  v. 
2  3f.),  and  in  Matthew  xxiii.  i8ff.  He  seems  to  show 
a  truly  Jewish  reverence  for  the  altar.  At  all 
events  it  is  easy  to  see  that  for  the  early  Church, 
to  which  the  Old  Testament  was  "  Scripture," 
there  was  a  problem  to  be  solved  :  What  about 
the  ritual  law  ?  It  is  to  this  problem,  in  one 
important  aspect  of  it,  that  the  writer  "  to  the 
Hebrews  "  addresses  himself. 

Two  ways  were  open  to  him.  He  might 
spiritualise  the  ritual  regulations,  in  the  way 
with  which  we  have  since  become  familiar.  He 
chooses  however  another  exit  from  the  difficulty  ; 
he  treats  the  ritual  partly  as  a  parable,  partly  as 
a  prophecy.  The  Holy  Spirit,  who  inspires  Scrip- 
ture, teaches  not  only  by  word  and  story  but  by 
the  institutions  of  the  Old  Covenant.  In  the  very 
construction  of  the  tabernacle,  He  teaches,  with 
its  forecourt  and  mysterious  Most  Holy  Place, 
there  is  the  lesson  that  until  the  Christ  comes  the 
way  to  God  is  barred.  The  whole  of  the  ritual  was 
a  shadowy  and  unsatisfying  pantomime  of  the  work 
that  Jesus  later  was  to  do  effectively  and  once  for  all. 

One  point  seems  clear.  This  chapter  was  not 
written  by  a  man  or  for  men  who  had  turned 
in  weariness  and  contempt  from  a  disappointing 
experience  of  the  sacrificial  system.  Neither  writer 
nor  readers  seem  to  have  had  any  firsthand  acquaint- 
ance with  Jewish  sacrifices.  If  they  had  had  any, 
surely  the  author  would  have  written   with   more 

139 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

regard  for  the  realities  of  the  case.  His  thought 
is  not  of  the  temple  of  his  day,  but  of  the  ancient 
tabernacle.  He  does  not  stop  to  ask  whether  this 
tabernacle  ever  existed.  Certainly  in  the  form  in 
which  it  is  described  by  the  priestly  writers,  it  did 
not  exist  at  the  time  and  in  the  circumstances  in 
which  they  place  it.  Even  on  the  most  literal  read- 
ing of  the  story  the  tabernacle  was  not  yet  erected 
at  the  time  the  Sinai  covenant  was  inaugurated. 

The  author  speaks  of  the  ark  of  the  covenant  ; 
but  so  far  as  we  know,  from  the  time  of  the  Exile 
the  ark  had  been  only  a  memory.  In  other  words, 
the  institutions  and  the  ritual  to  which  this  writer 
goes  for  his  prophecy  of  the  priestly  work  of  Jesus, 
he  knows  not  by  experience  but  by  Bible  study. 
As  the  commentators  have  abundantly  shown,  he 
is  not  at  all  careful  to  confine  himself  to  the  Exodus 
account,  but  makes  much  use  of  traditional  Rabbinic 
additions. 

If  the  tabernacle  as  described  in  the  priestly 
documents  did  not  exist,  did  not  at  least  exist  as 
and  when  they  described  it  as  existing,  are  we  to 
discard  the  whole  story  ?  By  no  means.  It  is 
a  priestly  parable,  indicative  of  the  conditions 
under  which  we  may  draw  near  to  God  (ix.  9). 
But  a  parable  is  precisely  what  the  writer  "  to  the 
Hebrews  "  calls  the  tabernacle  and  its  ritual.  It 
might  be  too  much  to  infer  that  he  is  as  conscious 
as  we  are  that  the  priestly  accounts  of  the  taber- 
nacle  are   parable   rather  than   history.     It   seems 

140 


In  the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

safe  at  least  to  say  that  he  was  not  interested  in  the 
question  whether  the  priestly  tabernacle  of  Exodus 
ever  had  an  historical  counterpart. 

The  realisation  of  the  author's  attitude  to  the 
Old  Testament  narrative  sheds  light  on  various 
questions  raised  by  the  passage.  Modern  senti- 
ment has  sometimes  been  offended  by  the  promi- 
nence given  to  blood  in  certain  sections  of  the 
New  Testament.  The  original  associations  of  the 
blood  in  connection  with  animal  sacrifice  do  seem 
to  the  modern  mind  revolting  ;  but  it  is  easy  to 
exaggerate  greatly  the  extent  to  which  these  associa- 
tions are  retained  in  New  Testament  references  to 
the  death  of  Jesus.  The  Leviticus  text  read  : 
"  The  life  of  all  flesh  is  its  blood,"  and  perhaps  we 
do  not  seriously  distort  the  meaning  of  New 
Testament  writers  if  we  substitute  "  life "  for 
"  blood." 

In  this  chapter  (ix.)  the  author  uses  two  illus- 
trations, which  he  evidently  means  to  be  parallel. 
In  one,  the  ceremonies  at  the  inauguration  of  the 
first  covenant,  the  shedding  of  blood  is  declared  to 
be  essential  (ix.  22).  In  the  other,  the  death  of  a 
man  by  which  his  will  comes  into  force,  the  manner 
of  his  death  is  immaterial  (ix.  1 6).  It  is  noteworthy 
that  in  the  Synoptic  accounts  of  the  crucifixion 
there  is  no  reference  to  the  shedding  of  the  blood 
of  Jesus.  In  the  Fourth  Gospel,  perhaps  for 
theological  reasons,  the  shedding  of  Jesus'  blood 
is  mentioned   (xix.  34),  with    that  restraint   which 

141 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

characterises  the  whole  Gospel   record  in   dealing 
with  delicate  subjects. 

In  his  disregard  for  the  whole  system  of  "  clean  " 
and  "  unclean  "  foods  and  of  lustrations  for  cere- 
monial defilement,  the  author  has  the  explicit 
sanction  of  Jesus.  In  the  case  of  ritual  defilement 
contracted  by  contact  with  a  dead  body,  he  seems 
to  allow  some  kind  of  reality  to  the  defilement,  and 
to  acknowledge  that  the  application  of  running 
water,  with  which  had  been  mixed  the  ashes  of  a 
"  red,  unblemished,  unyoked  cow  "  that  had  been 
burned,  had  some  kind  of  efficacy  in  removing  this 
defilement,  which  after  all  was  only  skin-deep. 
Philo  would  not  have  acknowledged  that  the 
ceremony  produced  no  spiritual  effect,  any  more 
than  a  modern  Hindu  would  grant  that  the  defile- 
ment was  only  skin-deep.  This  author  shows  no 
interest  in  the  question. 

More  curious  still  is  the  fact  that,  if  one  were 
to  judge  from  this  passage  alone,  one  might  suppose 
that  it  was  his  considered  judgment  that,  under 
the  Old  Covenant,  no  Israelite  ever  had  the  con- 
sciousness of  sin  forgiven,  or  ever  made  approach 
to  God  except  by  the  way  of  bloody  sacrifice.  Yet 
he  presumably  knew  the  beginning  of  Psalm  xxxii.  : 
"  Blessed  are  they  whose  transgressions  are  for- 
given, whose  sins  are  covered."  He  must  have 
known  the  great  prophetic  passages  which,  whether 
condemning  the  sacrificial  system  or  not,  certainly 
repudiate  exclusive  reliance  on  it : — 

142 


In  the   Spirit  of  the   Eternal 

Jehovah  saith,  "  What  care  I 

For  your  multiplied  sacrifice  ? 
I  am  sick  of  burnt  offerings  of  rams 

And  the  fat  of  fed  beasts. 
Blood  of  bullocks,  of  lambs,  or  of  goats, 

Is  no  pleasure  to  me"  (Isa.  i.  n).1 

In  the  next  chapter  (x.  5-7)  he  himself  quotes  one 
of  these  passages  (Ps.  xl.  6-8)  ;  and  among  the 
heroes  of  faith  in  chapter  xi.  whose  approach  to 
God,  however  imperfect,  is  nevertheless  real,  in  only 
one  case  could  it  be  suggested  from  the  record  that 
that  approach  was  mediated  by  sacrifice. 

From  the  author's  point  of  view  there  is  no  real 
inconsistency.  The  tabernacle  and  its  ritual  are, 
just  as  he  calls  them,  a  "  parable  "  which  he  has 
found  in  his  sacred  book,  a  parable  told  by  the 
Holy  Spirit  as  later  parables  were  told  by  Jesus. 
We  must  not  press  the  details  of  this  parable,  any 
more  than  the  details  of  the  Gospel  parables.  Even 
in  dealing  with  the  point  on  which  he  insists  so 
strongly,  that  God's  covenant  like  a  human  will 
does  not  become  effective  till  a  death  takes  place, 
there  is  no  attempt  to  find  the  rationale  of  this. 
Nor  does  he  discuss  the  question  it  raises,  whether 
this  view  of  the  only  valid  approach  to  God  is  not 
reverting  to  the  belief  in  human  sacrifice,  which 
had  been  transcended  in  the  story  of  the  interrupted 
offering  of  Isaac.  We  must  not  forget  however, 
that  we  have  already  had  a  suggestive  discussion 

1  Isaiah  in  Modern  Speech,  by  J.  E.  McFadyen. 

H3 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

of  the  meaning  of  Jesus'  sufferings  and  death  in 
chapters  ii.  and  iv. 

In  using  the  language  of  the  ancient  ritual  the 
author  lifts  us  up  to  the  sphere  of  the  unseen  things 
that  abide.  The  old  ceremonies  dealt  with  ritual 
"  cleanness  "  and  "  uncleanness  "  ;  Jesus  dealt 
with  moral  and  spiritual  purity  and  defilement. 
The  old  ritual  gave  a  physical  sanctity  ;  Jesus 
gives  us  a  clean  conscience.  The  victims  of  the 
old  sacrifices  had  to  be  physically  perfect  ;  Jesus 
was  pure  in  heart.  The  unwilling,  unconscious 
victims  of  the  former  ritual  were  offered  by  the 
priest  :  Jesus  offered  Himself.  Under  the  old 
covenant  one  who  had  come  in  contact  with  a 
corpse  was  considered  unfit  to  enter  the  tabernacle. 
In  the  new  covenant  our  whole  lives,  except  in  so 
far  as  they  are  inspired  by  what  Jesus  has  done  for 
us,  are  lived  in  the  realm  of  death,  transient  and 
meaningless  when  they  are  not  positively  vicious. 
The  Christian  life  too  is  a  worship,  a  religious 
service  ("  latreuein,"  ix.  14)  ;  but  the  God  of  our 
worship  is  no  mysterious  Something  whose  exist- 
ence is  half  hinted  at  through  a  doorway  once  a 
year,  but  the  God  who  watches  over  His  people 
with  sleepless  vigilance,  the  "  living  God." 

The  most  striking  phrase  of  all  occurs  in  ix.  14  : 
"  through  eternal  spirit."  Why  did  the  offering 
of  Jesus  effect  what  the  offering  of  animals  failed 
to  effect  ?  Because  the  high  priest  was  Jesus  ; 
because  the  victim  was  Jesus,  the  spotless  Son  of 

144 


In  the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

God  ;  because  the  sacrifice  was  Jesus,  not  His 
blood,  but  His  life,  Himself  ;  because  the  offering 
was  not  made  to  provide  the  worshippers  with  a 
superficial  "  holiness  "  that  would  give  them  a 
spurious  standing  with  the  "  holy  "  God  ;  it  was 
an  offering  of  the  Son  by  the  Son,  who  was  the 
radiance  of  the  Father's  glory  and  the  very  image 
of  His  being  so  that  in  all  He  did  He  represented 
the  very  thought  of  God. 

The  author  here  answers  by  anticipation  a  ques- 
tion that  has  perplexed  the  modern  mind.  How 
can  religion,  communion  between  the  soul  and  its 
God,  depend  on  an  event  in  time,  an  event  that 
happened  in  a  small  and,  except  for  the  history  of 
religion,  unimportant  country  nineteen  hundred 
years  ago  ?  Can  the  spiritual  depend  on  the 
temporal  in  this  way  ?  The  question  is  more 
difficult  for  us  than  it  was  for  the  author  of  this 
epistle.  He  believed  that  the  appearance  and  the 
death  of  Christ  had  taken  place  "  at  the  end  of  the 
world  "  (ix.  26),  and  that  the  speedy  dissolution 
of  all  things  terrestrial  and  the  return  of  Jesus 
Himself  would  show  His  death  to  all  men  as 
having  the  central  significance  it  had  for  him. 
But  the  expected  did  not  happen.  The  ages  have 
rolled  on  ;  we  get  farther  and  farther  away  from 
the  historic  Calvary  ;  and,  outside  of  the  Christian 
religion,  the  days  of  His  flesh  do  not  divide  the 
history  of  mankind  into  two  epochs  as  they  do  for 
the  Christian. 

H5  K 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

The  writer  has  given  us  in  germ  the  only  answer 
we  can  ever  have,  the  only  answer  we  need.  What 
Jesus  did,  He  did  "  through  eternal  spirit."  The 
life  of  Christ  and  the  death  of  Christ  took  place 
under  conditions  of  time  and  space  ;  but  they 
take  us  into  the  eternal,  unseen  world  where  time 
and  space  are  forgotten.  The  life  of  Jesus,  and 
still  more,  His  death,  reveal  to  us  the  eternal 
thought  of  God  towards  man,  and  especially 
towards  the  sin  that  separates  man  from  God. 
At  all  costs  God  will  remove  the  barrier,  even  at 
the  cost  of  sharing  man's  life  and  bearing  the 
burden  of  his  sin.  The  feeling,  the  thought,  the 
purpose,  that  are  eternally  in  the  mind  of  God, 
Jesus  carried  out  in  the  realm  of  the  visible,  once 
for  all.  "  Let  us  draw  near  to  God  "  is  the  text 
of  this  author's  practical  discourse,  and  "  through 
eternal  spirit  "  is  the  motto  of  his  argument. 

This  writer,  then,  attempts  to  find  no  rationale 
of  sacrifice,  not  even  of  the  death  of  Christ.  It 
would  be  absurd  to  say  that  he  is  not  a  thinker  ; 
but  he  is  primarily  a  pastor  and  a  religious  teacher, 
full  of  concern  for  the  spiritual  condition  of  his 
pupils.  Here,  as  elsewhere  in  the  New  Testament, 
we  get  completely  out  of  touch  with  the  writer, 
unless  we  realise  that  he  is  not  writing  theology 
in  vacuo,  but  is  trying  to  interpret  a  memorable 
experience.  He  had  felt  that  something  stood 
between  him  and  God  and  knew  that  that  some- 
thing was  his  own  life.     If  we  do  not  feel  it,  it 

146 


In  the   Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

does  not  follow  that  we  are  nearer  God  than  he 
was,  or  have  more  intimate  communion  with  God 
than  he  had,  and  the  men  of  his  time  who  felt 
like  him.  It  is  as  true  to-day  as  then  that  "  the 
pure  in  heart  shall  see  God." 

Then  came  those  who  had  heard  the  Lord  (ii.  3) 
with  their  story  of  the  ministry  of  Jesus,  and  their 
assurance  that  "  Christ  died  for  our  sins  according 
to  the  Scriptures."  We  do  not  quite  know  how 
they  conceived  this  ;  probably  there  was  no  one 
dominating  conception.  With  those  who  were 
familiar  with  sacrificial  systems,  whether  from 
experience  or  from  literature,  the  imagery  of  that 
system  might  colour  their  thoughts  of  their  new 
experience.  As  Deissmann  has  reminded  us,  Paul 
thought  of  it  under  various  images.  Now  he  was 
an  accused  person  declared  "  not  guilty  "  ;  again 
an  enemy  of  God  whom  God  had  reconciled  to 
Himself  through  Christ.  At  one  time  he  was 
a  debtor  whose  debt  had  been  paid,  at  another 
a  slave  for  whom  the  ransom  price  had  been 
delivered.  Under  whatever  figure  the  experience 
was  represented,  the  experience  itself  was  always 
the  same  ;  through  the  life,  and  especially  through 
the  death,  of  Jesus  a  crushing  burden  had  been 
lifted,  a  new  sense  of  freedom  and  self-mastery  had 
been  given,  that  made  one  feel  a  "  new  creature  "  ; 
the  veil  that  hindered  free  intercourse  with  God 
had  been  torn  aside  ;  one  could  without  let 
or   hindrance   draw   near   to  God  ;    and    all    this, 

i47 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

explain  it  as  one  will,  had   been  effected   through 
Jesus. 

Were  they  mistaken  ?  Perhaps  for  no  previous 
generation  is  it  so  difficult  as  for  our  own  to  view 
with  an  unprejudiced  eye  the  data  for  answering 
that  question.  The  influence  of  the  personality, 
the  teaching,  the  work  of  Jesus,  has  so  penetrated 
the  thought  of  mankind,  not  only  of  the  Christian 
Church  but  of  the  whole  civilised  world,  that  we 
cannot  now,  by  any  effort  of  imagination,  picture 
what  the  world  would  be  had  Jesus  never  lived. 
We  know  in  a  measure,  though  we  very  imper- 
fectly realise,  what  Jesus  has  meant  to  the  life  of 
which  we  form  a  part.  But  it  is  hardly  an  exag- 
geration to  say  that  to-day  Jesus  is  at  once  the 
conscience  and  the  inspiration  of  mankind  ;  of  the 
Orient  hardly  less  than  of  the  nations  we  call 
Christian.  The  new  life  that  pulses  through 
India,  China  and  Japan,  the  awakening  of  Africa, 
the  new  hope  and  the  new  ambition  that  are  re-crea- 
ting countries,  even  continents,  that  but  yesterday 
were  sunk  in  intellectual  and  spiritual  stagnation  ; 
all  are  directly  the  work  of  that  same  Jesus  who 
lived  and  who  gave  His  life  "  in  the  spirit  of  the 
eternal."  Men  in  these  countries  might  use,  some 
of  them  in  fact  are  using,  dropping  the  metaphors, 
almost  the  same  language  of  what  they  owe  to 
Jesus  as  we  find  in  the  epistle  "  to  the  Hebrews." 

Does  the  author  put  too  great  a  stress  on  the 
death  of  Christ  as  opposed  to  His  life  ?     A  recent 

148 


In  the    Spirit   of  the   Eternal 

writer  has  told  us  that  Paul's  concentration  of 
faith  upon  the  crucifixion  and  resurrection  is  "  an 
unfortunate  element  which  has  left  a  trail  of 
morbid  sentiment  all  through  the  centuries  of 
Christianity."  It  is  easy  to  make  statements  of 
this  kind  when  for  nineteen  centuries  the  death 
and  resurrection  of  Jesus  have  been  regarded  as 
the  very  kernel  of  the  Gospel,  when  it  is  impossible 
for  any  human  being  to  say  what  the  history  of 
our  religion  would  have  been  had  the  emphasis 
been  placed  elsewhere. 

Judging  from  our  New  Testament  records  it 
seems  practically  certain  that,  but  for  the  belief 
that  "  Jesus  died  for  our  sins,"  our  religion  would 
have  had  no  history  at  all.  If  ever  we  are  tempted 
to  think  it  a  morbid  impulse  that  led  the  Church 
to  choose  and  to  abide  by  the  cross  as  the  symbol 
of  what  it  lives  by  and  what  it  stands  for,  we  can 
at  least  ask  ourselves  what  would  have  happened 
if  Jesus  had  chosen  to  live  a  few  more  years  and 
to  die  a  natural  death.  Would  His  influence  have 
been  greater,  more  inspiring,  healthier,  than  it  is 
to-day  ?  Let  those  believe  it  who  can.  We  cannot 
know  all  that  was  in  His  mind  ;  but  we  know  that 
when  He  saw  that  the  leaders  of  His  people  were 
determined  to  bring  Him  to  the  cross,  He  chose 
to  let  them  have  their  will.  In  making  this  choice 
He  believed  He  was  fulfilling  the  will  of  God. 
The  history  of  Christendom  from  that  day  has 
justified  His  choice. 

149 


CHAPTER   XII 

A  STEADY  GRIP  OF  OUR  CONFESSION 
(x-  i-39) 

The  argument  seems  to  be  finished — for  all  prac- 
tical purposes  it  is  finished — but  there  are  some 
scattered  threads  to  be  picked  up,  some  points  to 
be  underscored.  In  the  first  place  (x.  i)  then,  the 
author  reiterates  that  the  Law  is  only  a  shadow 
cast  before  by  the  glories  of  the  future.  Paul 
could  never  have  called  the  Law  a  shadow.  To 
him  in  his  pre-Christian  days,  with  its  heart-search- 
ing, impossible  demands  on  one's  moral  strength, 
it  was  a  grim,  a  fatal  reality.  But  to  this  author, 
if  the  Law  was  only  a  shadow,  at  least  it  was  a 
shadow,  forecasting,  however  dimly,  a  future  reve- 
lation. The  work  done  in  our  day  on  the  history 
of  religion  helps  us  to  enter  into  this  point  of 
view,  especially  when  we  remember  that  he  is 
speaking,  not  of  practices  prevalent  in  his  own 
time,  but  of  a  ritual  ascribed  to  an  age  long  gone 
by.  The  people  who  call  for  prophetic  censure 
are  not  those  who,  in  their  search  for  the  unknown 
God  and  for  peace  of  conscience,  devise  means  of 
approach  to  God  that  to  a  later  age  seem  pathetically 

150 


A   Steady   Grip   of   Our   Confession 

ineffective.  Rather  it  is  those  who  cling  to  the 
beliefs  and  practices  of  the  dim,  twilight  ages  of 
the  world  when  the  light  of  God's  truth  is  shining 
all  around  them. 

Three  verses  (x.  5-7)  of  Psalm  xl.  (6-8)  are  treated 
in  the  author's  characteristic  way  : — 

"  Sacrifice  of  animals  and   fruits   of  the   earth  thou   didst  not 
desire ; 
But  a  body  didst  thou  prepare  for  me. 
Holocausts  and  sin-ofFerings  thou  didst  not  ask. 
Then  said  I :    Lo  !     I  come. 

In  the  roll  of  the  book  thy  directions  are  written  for  me. 
To  do  thy  will,  my  God,  am  I  resolved." 

Even  here  he  clings  to  his  thesis  that  animal  sacri- 
fice was  ordained  by  God  as  a  shadowy  prophecy 
of  the  true  sacrifice.  In  the  first  place,  by  what 
may  have  originally  been  a  clerical  error,  the  phrase 
occurs  in  the  Greek  though  not  in  the  Hebrew, 
"  a  body  didst  thou  prepare  for  me."  It  is  on 
this  mistranslation,  suggesting  the  incarnation  as 
it  does,  that  the  author  bases  his  use  of  the  psalm. 
According  to  the  original  sense,  the  psalmist  comes 
with  a  roll-book  of  the  Law,  probably  "  Deutero- 
nomy," in  his  hand,  and  expresses  his  resolve  to 
do  God's  will  as  it  is  written  in  the  Law.  This 
author  drops  the  phrase  "  I  am  resolved  "  in  the 
last  line,  puts  the  whole  into  the  mouth  of  the 
Messiah,  and  thus  finds  the  meaning  that  the 
Messiah  comes  to  do  God's  will  by  offering  His 
own  body  in  sacrifice  instead  of  animal  sacrifice  ; 

151 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

which  offering  of  Himself  is  represented  as  foretold 
in  Scripture. 

Some  questions  suggest  themselves.  Is  it  quite 
correct  to  say,  as  the  author  says  here,  that  the 
constant  repetition  of  animal  sacrifices  is  a  proof  of 
their  ineffectiveness  (x.  2)  ?  Would  not  the  natural 
inference  be  that  whatever  efficacy  they  had  availed 
only  for  the  past,  that  each  new  day  and  hour 
brought  its  fresh  burden  of  sin  to  be  atoned  for 
by  new  offerings  ?  Even  among  Christians  do  not 
the  purest  have  to  wash  the  dust  of  life's  highway 
from  their  feet  ? 

Further,  he  expressly  denies  to  the  ritual  any 
power  of  winning  forgiveness  of  sins  (x.  4).  Once 
again  we  have  to  ask,  quite  apart  from  animal 
sacrifice,  did  the  saints  of  the  Old  Covenant  never 
know  the  experience  of  sin  forgiven  ?  To  say 
nothing  of  the  definite  promises  of  such  forgiveness 
in  the  law  books,  the  author  could  hardly  have 
forgotten  Isaiah's 

"Come,"  saith  Jehovah,  "and  now 
Let  us  reason  together. 
Your  sins,  though  like  scarlet,  may  yet 

Become  white  as  the  snow. 
And  though  they  be  crimson-red, 

They  may  yet  be  as  wool"  (i.  18).1 

It  was  at  least  true  that  the  prevailing  mood  of 
the  Old  Testament  was  that  of  unsatisfied  longing, 
of  waiting  for  a  fuller  revelation  of  God  and  more 

1  Isaiah  in  Modern  Speech,  by  J.  E.  McFadyen. 
152 


A    Steady    Grip   of   Our   Confession 

intimate  fellowship  with  Him,  that  the  Old  Testa- 
ment on  the  whole  pointed  forward.  From  the 
time  of  Jesus  the  Church  no  more  speaks  of  the 
Coming  One  ;  rather  the  only  Coming  One  is 
Jesus  Himself. 

That  the  Christian  has  no  artificial  protection 
from  sin  this  writer  well  knows.  His  reason  for 
sending  the  epistle  is  just  that  he  fears  that  his 
readers  are  drifting  away,  are  in  danger  of  com- 
mitting the  greatest  sin  of  all,  apostasy  from  the 
"  living  God."  How  then  can  he  draw  the  abso- 
lute distinction  he  does  between  the  permanent 
forgiveness  won  by  the  sacrifice  of  Jesus  and  the 
fleeting  satisfaction  that  is  the  best  the  old  ritual 
can  attain  ?  He  does  not  work  out  the  answer  to 
this  question.  He  is  quite  clear  that  even  Christian 
forgiveness,  even  the  Christian's  access  to  God, 
can  be  forfeited  ;  we  have  to  "  cling "  to  our 
confession.  But  if  we  do  cling  to  it,  then  the  sins 
we  commit  are  such  as  the  son  commits  when  he  is 
safe  in  his  father's  home,  not  like  the  daily  challenge 
of  the  rebel's  life  he  lived  in  the  far  country. 

All  through  we  have  to  remember  that  the 
author  is  describing  Christianity  not  as  a  life  but 
as  a  worship,  that  the  terms  he  uses  are  therefore 
ritual  rather  than  moral.  The  question  the  epistle 
seeks  to  answer  is  :  "  How  can  man  get  access  to 
God  ? "  The  author  is  as  convinced  as  Paul, 
though  he  puts  the  point  differently,  that  the 
answer     is  :     Not     through     anything     in     man's 

153 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

character,  not  through  any  human  achievement,  but 
only  through  something  done  on  our  behalf  once 
for  all  by  Jesus. 

Thus  he  represents  the  Messiah  as  saying,  in  the 
psalm  :  "  Behold,  I  come  to  do  thy  will "  (x.  9). 
On  his  exegesis  this  means  that  the  Messiah, 
rejecting  animal  sacrifice,  offers  His  own  body 
(again  we  note  there  is  no  emphasis  on  the  blood). 
"  It  is  in  this  will,"  he  adds,  "  through  the  offering 
of  the  body  of  Jesus  Christ,  once  for  all,  that  we 
are  sanctified "  (x.  10);  and  by  "sanctified"  he 
does  not  mean  "  made  perfect  in  character  "  ;  rather 
he  means,  "  made  ritually  holy  "  so  to  speak,  made 
fit  to  enter  the  presence  of  God.  Because  Jesus, 
who  shared  our  blood  and  flesh  (ii.  13,  14),  fulfilled 
the  will  of  God  by  living  and  by  dying  as  God 
would  have  Him,  He  has  raised  the  whole  human 
race  to  a  new  level  of  possibility,  removed  an 
ancient  disability,  and  given  access  to  God  to  all 
who  will  follow  Him  as  Captain  of  their  salvation. 

x.  19-25 

The  teacher  has  finished  his  argument  ;  the 
preacher  resumes  his  sermon.  In  Isaiah's  prophecy 
of  the  Joy  of  the  Redeemed  he  sang  : — 

"  And  there  a  pure  highway  shall  rise, 
To  be  called  '  The  Holy  Way,' 
The  unclean  shall  not  pass  over  it, 

Fools  shall  not  wander  therein  "  (xxxv.  8).1 

«  Isaiah  in  Modern  Speech,  by  J.  E.  McFadyen. 
15+ 


A   Steady   Grip   of   Our   Confession 

In  the  fourth  Gospel  Jesus  says,  "I  am  the 
Way."  Jesus,  says  this  writer,  has  opened  up  to 
us  the  Way  into  the  Holy  of  Holies,  into  the 
presence  of  God  Himself.  It  is  not  an  old  road 
modernised  with  new  ritual  or  up-to-date  theology  ; 
it  is  a  new  way,  a  living  way,  for  it  is  made  with 
the  life-blood  of  Jesus  Himself  ;  so  that  the  course 
of  time,  the  progress  of  thought,  the  wider  know- 
ledge of  other  ways,  can  never  lessen  its  sole  power 
to  carry  us  to  God.  As  in  one  solemn  moment 
each  year  the  high  priest  parted  the  curtain  that 
hid  the  Most  Holy  Place,  so  Jesus  by  His  "  flesh," 
by  His  life  and  death,  has  parted  for  us  the  curtain 
of  the  eternal.  "  With  a  loud  cry  Jesus  breathed 
His  last  ;  and  the  veil  of  the  Temple  parted  in 
two  from  top  to  bottom  "  (Mark  xv.  38).  Jesus 
has  not  only  made  the  way  ;  He  Himself  has 
entered  in,  the  great  High  Priest  over  God's  house. 
There  is  no  constraint  ;  God  will  not  compel 
us  to  come  in  as  the  host  in  the  parable  compelled 
the  homeless  wanderers  to  come  to  his  feast.  But 
does  not  the  whole  picture  conjured  up  impel  us 
to  follow  where  Jesus  leads  ?  This  writer  is  no 
sentimentalist  ;  he  makes  very  sparing  use  of  the 
language  of  the  emotions,  far  less  than  Paul  does. 
Part  of  the  power  of  the  Synoptic  Gospels  is  just 
that  their  writers  had  the  literary  art  to  let  the 
story  speak  for  itself.  They  repeat  the  sayings 
and  recount  the  incidents,  with  never  an  exclama- 
tion, hardly  a  comment.     Made  great  by  the  story 

i55 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

they  have  to  tell,  they  simply  present  Jesus  who 
has  meant  so  much  to  them,  and  leave  Him  to  make 
His  own  impression  on  their  readers.  The  writer 
"  to  the  Hebrews  "  goes  into  no  rhapsodies  over 
the  love,  call  it  rather  the  heroic,  self-forgetting 
comradeship,  that  sent  Jesus  on  the  way  of  blood, 
to  open  for  us  the  door  that  hid  God  ;  but  his 
reticence  does  not  conceal  from  us  how  profoundly 
he  was  moved. 

"  We  have  courage "  (one  of  the  author's 
favourite  words)  "  then  to  enter  in.  Let  us  draw 
near "  (a  technical  term  of  worship),  "  forgetting 
the  hindrances  that  have  hitherto  barred  our  access 
to  God,  clean  alike  in  conscience  and  body  through 
the  new  standing  before  God  that  our  Captain  has 
won  for  us"  (x.  19-22).  (It  is  possible  that  in 
"  our  body  washed  with  clean  water "  there  is 
a  reference  to  baptism  ;  but,  as  "  the  sprinkling 
of  the  heart  "  is  certainly  metaphorical,  the  other 
phrase  may  be  also.) 

"  We  have  all  repeated  the  confession  of  the 
Christian  hope.  Let  us  keep  a  grip  of  that  con- 
fession. We  put  our  trust  in  God  ;  God  is  worthy 
of  our  trust.  God  has  promised  ;  He  will  keep 
His  promises"  (x.  23).  Here  then  is  the  "gracious 
circle."  We  trust  in  the  finished  work  of  Jesus, 
because  God  is  what  He  is  ;  our  confidence  in 
God  comes  from  this,  that  in  the  offering  of  Jesus 
we  believe  we  are  looking  into  the  very  inmost 
thought  of  God  towards  us. 

156 


A    Steady    Grip    of   Our    Confession 

In  this  passage  the  noble  eloquence  of  the  writer 
takes  one  of  its  loftiest  flights  ;  yet  here  as  much 
as  anywhere  his  thought  has  to  be  interpreted 
before  it  makes  its  full  impression  on  us.  We 
think  of  our  separation  from  God  under  moral 
and  spiritual  categories  ;  he  thinks  of  it  under 
ritual  categories.  It  needs  an  effort  of  imagination 
to  realise  that  it  is  the  same  experience  he  is  inter- 
preting. The  following,  for  example,  taken  from 
a  lecture  by  Dr.  Sidney  Cave,  reads  almost  like 
a  translation  of  the  thesis  of  this  epistle  for  the 
benefit  of  modern  Indian  readers. 

"  Converts  from  caste  Hinduism  feel  the  appeal 
of  Christ's  words,  they  gain  from  Him  something 
of  His  confidence  in  God's  love,  and  because  of 
this  they  know  themselves  to  be  liberated  from 
the  bondage  of  the  karmic  order,  that  they  may 
be  no  longer  cogs  in  a  great  machine,  but  the 
children  of  a  heavenly  Father  who  is  active  in 
their  lives,  and  to  whose  mercy  and  faithfulness 
they  can  gladly  leave  the  final  issue  of  their  own 
and  others'  lives."  l  He  thinks  of  Jesus  as  having, 
in  His  capacity  as  a  member  of  the  human  race, 
dealt  on  behalf  of  mankind  with  death  and  sin,  and 
so  having  started  man  on  a  new  and  final  chapter 
of  potential  achievement  ;  but  the  modern  writer 
is  interpreting  the  same  experience  as  the  ancient. 

That  the  author  has  no  mechanical  view  of 
permanent    "  purification  "    will    presently    appear 

»  "Rebirth  or  Immortality,"  in  Expositor,  February  1924,  p.  119. 

157 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

when  he  utters  his  solemn  warning  against  men 
who  give  up  the  Christian  Faith.  Even  in  this 
sentence  it  is  not  the  priest  who  speaks  but  the 
prophet.  "  As  we  think  of  this  revelation  of  the 
love  of  God  and  of  Jesus,  let  us  take  thought  for 
each  other,  trying  to  stir  up  a  paroxysm  of  loving, 
kindly  deeds  "  (x.  24).  (We  think  of  a  very  different 
kind  of  paroxysm  (the  same  word,  Acts  xv.  39) 
that  once  sprang  up  between  Paul  and  Barnabas.) 
"  Do  not  desert  your  Christian  meeting,  as  some 
are  in  the  habit  of  doing.  Rather  exhort  each 
other,  and  all  the  more  as  you  see  God's  great  day 
approaching"  (x.  25). 

"  The  meetings  "  were  presumably  stated  meet- 
ings for  worship.  One  suggestion  is  that  these 
dissidents  were  leaving  "  their  own  congregation  " 
to  attend  another  in  the  same  city  ;  another  is 
that  some,  in  fancied  superiority  to  the  weak 
brothers  who  were  causing  the  author  so  much 
anxiety,  were  withdrawing  from  fellowship  with 
them.  Judging  from  the  context,  especially  from 
the  following  section,  the  most  likely  supposition 
is  that  some  members  of  the  community,  who  at 
one  time  had  had  an  enthusiastic  Christian  faith  and 
still  had  some  kind  of  attachment  to  the  fellowship, 
had  grown  cold  ;  under  the  influence  of  perse- 
cution, long-continued  waiting  for  the  return  of 
Jesus  that  never  came,  imperfect  understanding  of 
the  centrality  of  Jesus,  and  the  attraction  of  other 
faiths. 

158 


A   Steady   Grip   of   Our   Confession 

The  waning  of  their  enthusiasm  showed  itself  in 
indifference  to  their  fellow-Christians,  and  in  failure 
to  attend  the  Christian  meetings  ;  while  apparently, 
without  realising  the  disloyalty  involved,  they  began 
occasionally  to  join  in  the  devotions  of  represen- 
tatives of  other  faiths.  This  writer,  like  other  New 
Testament  writers,  thinks  of  Christians  as  members 
of  a  fellowship  ;  the  individual  who  leaves  the 
fellowship  can  no  more  retain  the  fervour  of  his 
faith  and  hope  and  love  apart  from  the  central  fire 
of  the  common  life  than  the  coal  can  keep  its  heat 
when  ejected  from  the  furnace.  They  were  of 
those  who  say  they  get  nothing  out  of  the  Church 
and  forget  that  the  real  question  is,  "  What  can 
we  put  into  the  Church  ?  "  A  little  kindly  thought 
for  the  needs  and  difficulties  of  their  fellow-Chris- 
tians would  have  been  the  best  of  all  tonics  for 
their  drooping  faith.  Instead  of  that,  they  had 
been  guilty  of  the  greatest  heresy  of  all,  the  sin  of 
discouraging  the  people. 

x.  26-31 

This  leads  to  the  third  of  the  three  passages  on 
the  "  unpardonable  sin  "  (cf.  ii.  1—4  ;  vi.  3—8).  It 
is  as  uncompromising  as  the  others,  but  makes  it 
even  clearer  what  kind  of  "  sin  "  he  has  in  mind. 
The  first  word  in  the  paragraph  is  "  deliberately," 
its  position  giving  it  unusual  emphasis.  He  :'s 
thinking  of  no  "  slip,"  but  of  a  course  of  conduct 
entered  on  with  one's  eyes  open.     The  person  he 

*59 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

despairs  of  has  "  trampled  on  God's  Son,  treated 
the  covenant  blood  which  gave  Him  his  standing 
with  God  as  if  it  were  like  any  other  blood,  and 
insulted  the  gracious  Spirit  which  prompted  the 
work  of  redeeming  love  "  (x.  29).  His  sin  is  that 
of  the  man  who  once  followed  with  Jesus  but  now 
is  with  those  who  shout  "  Crucify  Him  ! " 

All  through  the  epistle  the  author  has  been 
heaping  up  comparatives  to  show  the  superiority 
of  the  New  Covenant  to  the  Old.  But  the  measure 
by  which  the  covenant  inaugurated  by  Jesus  towers 
above  the  Sinai  covenant  is  also  the  measure  of  the 
added  responsibility  of  those  who  have  heard  the 
Gospel.  Under  the  old  covenant,  the  criminal  died 
"  on  the  testimony  of  two  or  three  witnesses  "  (x.  28). 
Why  does  he  recall  this  detail  ?  Not  only  to  remind 
us  that  even  the  old  law  had  strict  regard  for  justice. 
Was  he  not  thinking  also  of  the  little  company  of 
two  or  three  that  met  together  in  Jesus'  name, 
a  tiny  band  all  but  swallowed  up  in  the  throngs 
of  "  unbelievers  "  all  round  them  ;  of  the  dis- 
heartening discovery  that  one  "  brother "  after 
another  was  forsaking  their  little  "  gathering  "  ; 
of  the  sense  of  outrage  when  each  new  Judas  was 
found  to  have  gone  over  to  the  enemy,  even  though, 
like  those  who  crucified  Jesus,  he  did  not  fully 
realise  what  he  was  doing  ? 

Something  more  terrible  than  the  death  of  the 
body  will  be  the  fate  of  those  who  have  once  felt 
the  spell  of  Jesus  and  then  have  joined  His  enemies. 

160 


A    Steady    Grip   of   Our   Confession 

The  author  draws  a  very  human  picture  of  God, 
like  any  earthly  tyrant,  exacting  a  terrible  vengeance 
from  apostates  (x.  30),  a  picture  which  falls  below 
the  level  of  the  New  Testament  conception  of  God, 
and  one  for  which  the  materials  are  two  misquo- 
tations from  "Deuteronomy"  (xxxii.  3$f.).  When 
David  got  his  choice  he  said  :  "  Let  us  fall  into 
the  hand  of  the  Lord,  ...  let  me  not  fall  into 
the  hand  of  man  "  (2  Sam.  xxiv.  14),  as  Sir  Richard 
Grenville  in  a  later  day  would  have  chosen  to  fall 
into  the  hands  of  God,  not  into  the  hands  of  Spain. 
11  It  is  terrible,"  says  this  writer,  "  to  fall  into  the 
hands  of  the  living  God."  We  do  not  speak  like 
that  nowadays  ;  yet  Jesus  and  Paul  are  with  the 
author  of  "  To  the  Hebrews  "  in  the  solemnity 
with  which  he  speaks  of  the  fate  of  those  who, 
knowing  the  better,  choose  the  worse. 

x.  32-34 
As  in  chapter  vi.  the  author  turns  away  from  the 
gloomy  picture  he  has  conjured  up  and  insists  that 
"  some  better  thing  "  is  in  store  for  his  friends. 
He  has  one  last  appeal  to  make.  Blessed  is  the 
man  who  is  not  afraid  to  recall  his  past;  and  the 
record  of  these  men  is  such  that  their  pastor  can 
tell  them  to  "  remember,"  remember  a  time  when 
they  were  nearer  God  than  they  are  now,  when 
their  Christian  faith  and  love  had  all  the  glad 
enthusiasm  of  morning,  when  in  their  new-found 
Christian    joy    their    hearts    were    swelling    with 

161  1 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

gratitude  to  God,  and  nothing  they  were  called  on 
to  do  or  suffer  could  even  begin  to  pay  the  debt 
they  owed. 

They  had  been  subjected  to  public  insult  and 
wrong.  When  they  themselves  escaped  this  fate, 
of  their  own  accord  they  took  their  places  beside 
their  friends  who  were  being  so  treated.  When 
their  Christian  comrades  were  cast  into  prison,  in 
spirit  they  shared  their  lot,  and,  as  Jesus  had 
directed  them,  they  openly  helped  the  prisoners. 
Robbed  of  their  own  goods,  perhaps  in  consequence 
of  this  public  display  of  sympathy  for  "  criminals," 
they  had  remembered  how  the  Master  had  said  : 
"  Rejoice  and  exult  when  men  insult  you  and 
persecute  you."  They  knew  they  had  a  better 
possession  that  no  man  could  take  from  them. 

x.  35f. 

Was  it  all  to  go  for  nothing,  all  the  joy  and 
spiritual  triumph  of  those  glad  days  ?  Their 
pastor  cannot  think  it.  They  are  not  going  to  lose 
their  "  bold  spirit "  now.  God  does  not  forget. 
(The  word  he  uses  to  indicate  that  God  "  pays 
back  "  kindnesses  (x.  35)  is  the  same  word  as  he 
used  in  ii.  2  to  indicate  that  under  the  Old  Cove- 
nant every  transgression  received  its  just  requital.) 
They  are  on  the  "  last  lap  "  ;  but  it  is  the  last  lap, 
even  the  last  few  yards,  that  test  the  runner. 
What  they  need  is  to  "  hold  out "  (one  of  his 
favourite  words). 

162 


A   Steady   Grip   of   Our   Confession 

x.  37f. 

A  quotation  from  Habakkuk,  which  combines 
the  usual  appositeness  of  his  quotations  with  the 
usual  daring  disregard  of  the  original  meaning  of 
the  words,  serves  the  double  purpose  of  a  final 
warning  and  an  introduction  to  the  classic  chapter 
on  faith.  In  face  of  some  great  heathen  power 
that  had  terrorised  not  Israel  only  but  the  world, 
Habakkuk  had  received  from  God  the  message 
that  God  will  send  a  vision,  will  so  reveal  Himself 
in  the  future  historical  development  of  the  people 
that  His  honour  and  His  truth  will  be  vindicated. 
Until  that  vindication  comes,  the  pious  man  must 
keep  his  trust  in  God  ;  "  His  steadfastness  will  be 
his  life." 

As  transformed  by  this  author  the  prophecy 
means  :  "  The  Coming  One  (Messiah)  shall  come 
immediately,  and  (my)  just  man  shall  find  life 
through  his  faith  ;  and  if  he  shrinks  back  my  soul 
has  no  pleasure  in  him  "  (x.  39).  We,  he  concludes, 
with  that  boldness  which,  in  dealing  with  the  timid, 
so  often  achieves  its  purpose,  are  not  the  men  to 
be  guilty  of  that  shrinking  which  means  spiritual 
death  ;  ours  is  the  faith  that  makes  men  masters 
of  their  souls. 


163 


CHAPTER   XIII 

THE  CLOUD  OF  WITNESS-BEARERS 
(xi.   1-40) 

With  this  reference  to  faith  the  author  reaches  a 
section  of  his  epistle  which,  as  a  specimen  of  sus- 
tained Christian   eloquence,  stands   out  even   from 
the  New  Testament  literature.     As  with  all  true 
eloquence,  the  language  soars  because  the  thoughts 
have  wings.     The   English  reader  is  fortunate  in 
that  the  King  James  version  has  given  us  a  render- 
ing that  has  lost  little  of  the  spirit  of  the  original. 
Once  more  we  are  reminded  that,  while  the  author's 
argument   revolves    round    the    high-priesthood   of 
Jesus,  his  theme  is,  as  he  says  it  is,  "  the  world  to 
come  "  (ii.  5).     At  the  end  of  the  epistle  he  tells 
his  readers  that  he  has  written  "  a  word  of  exhor- 
tation "    (xiii.    22).     These    two    phrases    exactly 
describe  his  subject  and  his  object.     He  is  trying 
to  rouse  to  greater  earnestness  a  company  of  people 
who  lie  very  near  his  heart,  to  lift  them  to  a  higher 
spiritual  plane,  in  which  they  will  see  more  truly 
the  issues  of  life.     This  he  does  by  speaking  of 
"  the  world  to  come,"  the  world  of  unseen  realities. 
Through    the    priestly    self-offering    of  Jesus    this 

164 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

world  is  no  longer  hidden  from  us.     "  Let  us  draw 
near  to  God." 

Pushed  to  a  logical  extreme,  the  argument  on 
the  "  offering  "  of  Jesus  would  mean  that  all  the 
"  fathers "  lived  lives  of  conscious  failure  and 
acknowledged  exclusion  from  the  presence  of  God  ; 
that  however  diligently  they  sought  God,  they 
never  in  any  real  sense  found  Him,  Some  meaning 
like  that  could  be  read  into  the  saying  of  Jesus 
that  the  Baptist,  who  was  the  flower  of  the  human 
race  before  the  coming  of  the  Kingdom,  would 
take  a  very  humble  place  in  the  Kingdom  itself 
(Matt.  xi.  1 1). 

This  eleventh  chapter  does  not  on  the  whole 
contradict  that  impression.  The  coming  of  Jesus, 
and  especially  His  death,  was  the  event  towards 
which  the  whole  previous  history  of  God's  dealings 
with  His  people  had  been  leading  up.  Until 
Jesus  parted  the  veil,  no  one  could  effectively  say, 
"  Let  us  draw  near  to  God."  Yet  the  author  is 
evidently  conscious  that  the  picture  he  has  drawn 
of  the  religious  failure  of  the  Old  Covenant  is 
misleading.  To  say  that  until  Christ  came  there 
was  no  real  sense  of  sin  forgiven  or  fellowship 
with  God  was  not  the  whole  truth.  On  the  con- 
trary, there  were  splendid  pages  of  Old  Testament 
history  that  told  of  temptations  resisted,  of  trust 
triumphing  over  fear  and  loss,  over  pain  and  death, 
because  there  were  men  and  women  even  then  who 
knew  God  and  walked  with  God. 

165 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

Not  only  so  ;  there  were  heroes  and  heroines 
of  faith  in  the  long  ages  before  Jesus  whom  men 
and  women  in  the  more  favoured  days  of  the  new 
revelation  might  well  take  as  models.  Indeed  we 
largely  miss  the  point  of  the  whole  chapter  if  we 
do  not  realise  the  part  it  plays  in  the  author's 
appeal  to  his  readers.  It  is  not  just  a  "  tale  of 
golden  deeds."  It  is  an  historical  recital  meant 
to  revive  drooping  hope  and  courage,  to  put  iron 
into  the  blood  of  those  whose  moral  stamina  was 
weakening.  Here,  the  writer  seems  to  say,  were 
men  and  women  in  days  gone  by  who  faced  the 
same  difficulties  and  temptations,  the  same  cruel 
persecutions  you  have  to  face  ;  who  never  "shrank  " 
but  marched  breast-forward,  never  doubted  God's 
existence  or  God's  goodness,  or  dreamt  for  a 
moment  that  ultimately  the  oppressor  would 
triumph.  Epoch-making  as  the  coming  of  Jesus 
was,  yet  Moses  and  Jesus,  the  faithful  of  old  time 
and  the  faithful  of  to-day,  belong  to  the  one  house- 
hold of  faith  (iii.  5,  6). 

He  has  shown  us  the  Old  Covenant  at  its  worst. 
Here,  he  seems  to  say,  is  the  Old  Covenant  at  its 
best.  From  the  days  of  Moses,  from  long  before 
the  days  of  Moses,  there  were  pious  souls  who 
lived  "  in  the  spirit  of  the  eternal."  He  speaks 
of  "  the  world  to  come  "  ;  but  in  a  very  real  sense 
the  world  to  come  had  been  present  from  the 
beginning  for  those  who  had  the  eyes  to  see  it. 
He  invites  his  readers  to  ascend  with  him  this  Old 

166 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

Testament  Mount  of  Transfiguration,  and  hold 
converse  for  a  time  with  the  saints  of  the  past,  who 
had  triumphed  over  the  limitations  of  time  and 
sense  and  dwelt  with  God  in  the  world  of  unseen 
realities. 

These  men  and  women  saw  the  vision  "  from 
afar"  (xi.  13),  as  Christian  and  Hopeful  on  the 
Delectable  Mountains  saw  the  gates  of  the  Celes- 
tial City  from  afar  ;  but  they  saw  it.  They  held 
out,  not  as  if  they  saw,  but  actually  seeing  Him 
who  is  hidden  from  all  human  eyes  (xi.  27).  The 
epistle  provides  one  answer  for  those  who  still  ask 
about  the  place  of  the  Old  Testament  in  the  sacred 
literature  of  the  Church.  There  are  things  in  the 
Old  Testament  that  have  had  their  day  ;  there  is 
teaching  that  gives  imperfect  or  even  distorted 
views  of  God  ;  there  are  ritual  regulations  that  are 
for  us'  but  parables,  some  of  them  not  very  helpful 
even  as  parables.  Yet  to  drop  the  Old  Testament 
from  our  canon  would  be  to  deprive  the  Church 
of  a  rich  heritage,  of  a  literature  that  breathes  the 
very  presence  of  God,  of  the  records  of  the  only 
men  and  women  in  the  days  before  Christ  to  whose 
story  we  turn  primarily  because  it  leads  us  to  God. 

These  historical  retrospects  are  a  familiar  form 
of  Hebrew  literature.  We  find  them  for  example 
in  the  farewell  address  of  Joshua,  in  various  psalms, 
in  the  message  of  the  dying  Mattathias  to  his  sons, 
and  in  the  defence  of  Stephen.  In  this  chapter  it 
is  a  poet  who  speaks  ;    and  he  claims  at  times  the 

167 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

same  freedom  in  the  treatment  of  Old  Testament 
history  as  he  uses  in  his  exegesis  of  Old  Testament 
texts. 

In  seme  cases  the  record  had  already  been  trans- 
figured before  it  reached  the  sacred  page.  To 
the  people  of  the  time  who  knew  anything  of  it, 
perhaps  in  a  measure  even  to  Abraham  himself, 
his  migration  doubtless  seemed,  like  any  other 
migration,  dictated  largely  by  economic  considera- 
tions. Later,  men  saw  in  it  a  divine  "  call,"  a 
purpose  of  God  not  only  for  Abraham  and  his 
descendants  but  for  the  human  race.  The  nomad 
life  was  the  very  symbol  of  the  transient,  with  its 
eternal  pitching  and  striking  of  tents,  here  to-day, 
gone  to-morrow.  The  writer  "  To  the  Hebrews  " 
represents  Abraham  as  consciously  seeking  a  city  ; 
but  it  was  no  earthly  city  that  Abraham  looked 
for  ;  it  was  a  city  in  which  the  weary  wanderer 
might  find  the  Rest  of  Gcd  ;  one  whose  buildings 
were  on  solid  foundation,  as  for  men  who  had 
chosen  an  abiding  place,  a  city  planned  and  built 
by  God. 

On  the  whole  the  sights  and  sounds  that  greet 
us  in  the  Gospel  story  are  those  of  the  country  ; 
Jesus  was  a  Man  of  the  open  air,  of  the  village 
and  the  country  town,  one  who  loved  to  be  en  the 
road,  among  farms  arc  vineyards,  by  the  lakeside 
or  on  the  hill.  Yet  it  was  not  strange  that  the 
imagination  of  the  early  Christians  should  inherit 
the   Jewish    fancy   that   the    ideal    home    of  Gee's 

16S 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

people  was  a  city.  A  city  represents  strength, 
and  knowledge,  and  culture.  More  than  that  :  the 
Christian  Church  was  the  "  fellowship,"  and  the 
city  presented  at  least  the  possibility  of  a  mighty 
fellowship  such  as  the  desert  and  the  village  could 
never  give.  Moreover  to  men  of  a  missionary 
faith,  a  great  metropolis  that  like  a  magnet  drew 
to  itself  people  of  all  classes  and  races  and  creeds 
seemed  like  a  parable  of  the  Church. 

The  work  of  the  apostle  Paul  had  centred  largely 
in  the  great  cities  :  in  Ephesus  and  Philippi, 
Corinth  and  Athens.  "  Rome  for  Christ  "  repre- 
sented the  summit  of  his  Christian  ambition.  To 
the  early  Christian  imagination  there  were  two 
cities  that  could  appeal  beyond  all  others.  Of 
these  Jerusalem  had  already  crucified  the  Christ, 
perhaps  had  already  fallen  by  the  time  this  letter 
was  written.  Rome  had  already  entered  on  that 
bloody  persecution  of  the  Church  that  gave  us  the 
book  of  Revelation.  Can  we  wonder  that  the 
hopes  of  the  Christians  took  the  shape  of  a  new 
Jerusalem  ? 

Sometimes  the  author  idealises  the  narrative 
without  direct  authority  from  the  Bible  record. 
Thus  in  speaking  of  the  birth  of  Isaac  he  ignores 
the  incredulity  of  both  Abraham  and  Sarah.  He 
ascribes  Abraham's  willingness  to  sacrifice  Isaac 
to  his  confidence  that  God  could  raise  his  son  from 
the  dead.  He  tells  us  that  Moses  left  Egypt  (and 
went    to    Midian)    "  with    no    fear    of   the    king's 

169 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

anger,"  which  is  hardly  the  impression  we  get 
from  the  second  chapter  of  "  Exodus."  For  such 
poetic  liberties  we  may  blame  him  if  we  have 
never  been  guilty  of  straining  a  Biblical  text  in 
order  to  make  a  homiletic  point. 

In  its  familiarity  with  the  unseen  this  chapter 
makes  something  of  the  same  impression  on  us 
as  is  made  by  a  study  of  the  records  of  Jesus. 
Reading  the  Gospels,  we  feel  that  we  are  in  the 
presence  of  One  who  lived  always  in  the  presence 
of  God  ;  one  to  whom  God  was  not  an  inference 
or  a  presupposition,  not  a  convention  or  an  item 
in  a  creed,  but  "  Father."  To  Him  the  unseen 
was  as  real  as  the  seen.  Yet  there  is  this  difference. 
In  the  Synoptics  at  least,  Jesus  was  always  at  home 
in  His  Father's  world.  To  this  writer  the  patri- 
archs were  pilgrims  and  strangers,  sojourning  for 
a  time  in  an  alien  land  till  they  could  reach  the 
eternal  city  that  God  had  prepared  for  them.  In 
the  infancy  of  the  Church,  and  in  a  time  of  perse- 
cution such  as  faced  the  writer  and  readers  of  this 
epistle,  it  was  natural  to  think  of  Christians  too  as 
men  whose  only  citizenship  was  in  heaven.  The 
civil  power  of  Rome  had  begun  to  throw  its  weight 
against  them  as  the  religious  authorities  in  Jeru- 
salem did  at  the  beginning.  It  was  hardly  an 
exaggeration  to  say  that  "  the  world  "  was  against 
them,  and  it  was  natural,  therefore,  to  think  that 
they  were  not  of  "  the  world." 

For  that  sense  of  the  unseen  which  is  the  theme 
170 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

of  this   chapter  the  author  uses  the  word  "  faith." 
It  was  not  quite  what  Jesus  had  meant  by  "faith." 
Jesus  had  thought  rather  of  the  healing  power  of 
God  as   flowing  all  around  us.     To  throw  down 
the  barriers  that  human  nature  erects  against  Divine 
influence,  to  open  the  sluice-gates  and  let  the  life- 
giving  streams  flow  in,  that  is  the  work  of  faith. 
Still  less  has  the  author  in  mind  that  mystic  union 
with  Christ  which  Paul  calls  faith.     For  this  writer 
"  faith  "  is  the  faculty  that  enables  us  to  transcend 
sense  and  apprehend  the  eternal  verities.     "  It  is 
through  faith  that  we  know  our  hopes  will  come 
true,   that   we  realise   the   unseen  "   (xi.  i).     It   is 
only  by  an   act  of  faith  that  we   recognise  that  the 
very  stage  on   which   the   whole   drama  has   been 
enacted  was  made  and  ordered  by  "  the  word  of 
God,"   that  this  visible  world  is  the  embodiment 
of  ideas  that  exist,  invisible  to  us,  in  the  mind  of 
God  (xi.    3).     If  we  would   really   approach    God 
we  must  have  faith  that  God  exists,  that  they  who 
seek  Him  shall  find  that  God   controls  the  moral 
order  (xi.  6). 

To  the  author,  one  of  the  lessons  of  the  story 
is  that  again  and  again  God  had  intervened  to 
save  His  people  when  it  seemed  as  if  all  hope  had 
gone  ;  had  saved  them  while  men  simply  stood 
and  saw  the  salvation  of  God,  or  had  used  the 
humblest  instruments.  Had  Abraham  slain  Isaac, 
the  drama  would  have  been  played  out  almost  ere 
it  had  begun.     If  the  parents  of  Moses  had  not 

171 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

been  people  of  unusual  penetration  and  courage, 
pre-Christian  Israel  would  have  lost  its  central 
figure.  It  is  not  easy  to  realise  how  the  claims 
of  prudence,  gratitude  and  lifelong  friendships, 
of  culture  and  natural  ambition,  must  have  appealed 
with  almost  irresistible  force  to  Moses,  to  cast  in 
his  lot  with  the  Egyptians  rather  than  with  the 
downtrodden  serfs  that  he  called  his  people.  Had 
he  done  so,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  no  one  could  have 
taken  his  place.  Had  the  Red  Sea  not  done  just 
what  it  did  when  it  did,  and  surely  the  "  chances  " 
were  all  against  it,  the  story  would  all  have  had 
to  be  written  differently.  These  "  ifs  "  exist  for 
us,  but  not  for  God.  He  sees  the  end  from  the 
beginning.  The  purposes  of  God  that  this  writer 
calls  the  "  promises  "  may  have  a  long,  and  to 
human  eyes,  a  dubious  history  ;  but  in  the  long- 
run  history  vindicates  the  man  of  "  faith "  to 
whom  the  future  is  as  certain  as  the  present  and 
the  unseen  as  real  as  the  seen. 

The  chapter  tells  of  faith  shown  in  the  morning 
of  life,  at  its  midday  and  its  evening,  faith  of  men 
and  women,  of  Jew  and  Gentile,  of  saint  and 
harlot.  It  was  at  Moses'  birth  that  the  splendid 
courage  of  his  parents  in  following  their  God- 
given  instinct  saved  him,  and,  saving  him,  made 
possible  the  salvation  of  his  people.  It  was  when 
Moses  "  grew  up  "  that,  with  full  realisation  of  all 
that  the  choice  meant,  he  cast  in  his  lot  with  the 
slaves,  whom  only  God-given  wisdom  could  recog- 

172 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

nise  as  the  bearers  of  the  torch.  Even  on  their 
deathbeds  Isaac,  Jacob  and  Joseph  were  as  certain 
that  God  was  guiding  as  they  had  been  in  the 
confidence  of  physical  and  intellectual  maturity. 

All    through    the    chapter    the    preacher    speaks 
with  his  eye  on  the  situation  of  his  readers,  but  he 
tactfully  leaves   them  to  make  the  application  for 
themselves.     Did  they  sometimes  feel  that  Chris- 
tians were  in  a  hopeless  minority  against  all  that 
counted    in    the    world    of   politics,    of  letters,    of 
religion  ?     Noah  had  stood  alone  against  a  scoffing 
world.     Did  they  sometimes  feel  inclined  to  give 
up  the  Christian  faith  as  a  piece  of  idealism  that 
had  no  place  in  a  practical  world,  and  to  cast  in 
their  lot  with  some  of  the  popular  world  faiths  ? 
If  the  patriarchs  had  wanted  to  return  to  the  heathen 
land  from  which  they  had  come  out,  they  could 
have  done  so.      They  held  on  because  they  knew 
that  the  land  of  their  adoption,  homeless  wanderers 
though  they  were  in  it,  was  the  true  pathway  to 
their  abiding  spiritual   home.     Did  they   feel   the 
disillusionment  that  comes  to  men  on  fire  with  a 
selfless  enthusiasm  when  they  find  how  unrespon- 
sive  the   world   is?     That   was   what    Moses   felt 
when  he  had  made  his  great  renunciation  for  the 
sake  of  his  people  and  then  learnt  that  his  people 
would  have  none  of  him.     He  fled  to  Midian,  in 
no   selfish   and   cynical   abandonment   of  his   life's 
work,  but  persevering  in  it  "  as  seeing  Him  who 

is  invisible." 

173 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

From  the  very  beginning  of  history  those  who 
lived  in  the  spirit  of  the  eternal  had  been  hated 
and  persecuted  by  others  whose  vision  was  limited  by 
the  seen  things  that  pass.  From  the  beginning  it  was 
the  men  of  the  earth-vision  that  seemed  to  triumph, 
but  only  in  the  myopic  view  of  those  like-minded 
with  themselves.  Cain  thought  he  had  brought 
Abel's  life  to  an  end  ;  on  the  contrary,  from  the  sacred 
page  the  voice  of  Abel  speaks  to  us  to  this  day. 

The  men  to  whom  this  letter  was  sent  were  bear- 
ing "  the  reproach  of  Christ  "  ;  some  of  them  were 
rinding  it  too  hard  to  bear.  The  author  reminds 
them  that  "  the  reproach  of  Christ "  was  no  new 
form  of  suffering  ;  the  bearing  of  it  manfully  was 
no  new  form  of  heroism.  The  world  was  made 
through  Christ  ;  the  spirit  of  Christ  had  not  then 
first  entered  the  world  when  Jesus  was  born  ;  nor 
did  the  spirit  of  the  persecutors  of  the  Christ  first 
come  to  life  in  the  men  who  hounded  Jesus  to 
death.  The  psalmist  did  not  know  all  that  he 
meant  when  he  said  :  "  Remember,  Lord,  the 
reproach  of  Thy  servants  .  .  .  wherewith  Thine 
enemies  .  .  .  have  reproached  the  footsteps  of 
Thine  anointed  "  (Psalm  lxxxix.  5of.).  Moses  in  his 
day  bore  the  reproach  of  Christ  ;  he  was  only  one, 
though  the  chief  one,  in  the  long  line  of  those  who 
had  chosen  the  path  of  suffering  and  found  it  also 
the  path  of  wisdom  ;  for  that  God  rewards  is 
one  of  the  writer's  most  certain  and  unashamed 
convictions  (xi.  26). 

i74 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

Did  the  readers  of  the  epistle  think  their  teacher 
a  too  stern  moralist,  who  saw  approaching  tragedy 
where  there  was  none  ?  It  had  been  so  in  the 
days  of  Noah,  yet  Noah  was  vindicated  ;  the 
only  people  who  were  "  saved  "  were  the  handful 
who  took  God's  warning  seriously  and  accepted 
God's  proffered  means  of  salvation.  Even  so  it 
was  in  the  days  of  the  Exodus  ;  there  was  tragedy 
afoot,  but  there  was  escape  for  those  who  would 
have  it  on  God's  terms.  Doubtless  there  were 
some  among  the  readers,  as  there  are  many  on  the 
mission-fields  to-day,  who  resented  the  family 
separations  involved  in  following  Jesus,  who  refused 
to  believe  it  was  God's  will  that  men  should  pluck 
out  eyes  and  cut  off  hands  "  for  the  sake  of  the 
Gospel."  Abraham  had  stood  the  test  when  the 
issues  at  stake  were  far  bigger  than  family  affection  ; 
when  it  seemed  as  if  the  very  continuance  of 
God's  purpose  in  the  world  depended  on  the  life 
of  Isaac. 

Sometimes,  as  at  Jericho,  God  wrought  His 
wonders  for  His  people  without  human  aid. 
Sometimes,  as  at  the  Red  Sea,  He  turned  aside  the 
threatened  danger  ;  or  again,  if  it  must  come,  He 
gave  His  people  courage  to  endure,  as  in  the  horrible 
tortures  that  the  Maccabees  and  others  suffered  so 
unflinchingly  (xi.  35ff.).  The  readers  were  tempted 
to  secure  their  redemption  from  death  at  the  price 
of  their  souls  ;  men  of  faith,  in  the  days  before 
Christ,   when   offered   their   lives   on   condition   of 

i75 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

abjuring  their  faith,  had  chosen  to  die  (xi.  35.     See 
the  stories  of  the  Maccabees). 

As  was  natural  in  the  circumstances,  the  triumph 
of  faith  over  fear,  and  especially  over  the  fear  of 
death,  was  prominent  in  the  author's  mind,  as  he 
wished  it  to  be  in  the  minds  of  his  readers.  They 
feared  the  wrath  of  the  emperor  ;  neither  Moses 
nor  the  parents  of  Moses  feared  the  wrath,  surely 
no  less  terrible,  of  the  emperor  of  their  day 
(xi.  23,  27).  God  has  so  many  ways  of  delivering 
from  the  fear  of  death  those  who  put  their  trust 
in  Him.  He  can  snatch  from  the  jaws  of  death, 
as  He  snatched  Isaac,  when  the  knife  was  in  his 
father's  hand.  As  in  the  case  of  Enoch,  we  may 
live  so  near  God  that  death  is  no  death,  but  only 
a  transition  to  a  fuller  fellowship.  The  faithful 
dead,  like  Abel,  live  on  in  this  sense,  that  their 
faith  inspires  us  to  a  like  faith  with  theirs  ;  for 
it  is  of  no  cry  for  vengeance  the  author  is  thinking 
when  he  tells  us  that  through  faith  Abel,  though 
dead,  is  still  speaking.  The  absence  of  anger  at 
or  desire  for  vengeance  on  persecutors  is  one  of 
the  characteristics  of  the  book.  The  living  spirit 
can  triumph  over  the  dying  body,  when  the  man 
of  faith  at  the  end  of  his  life  looks  out  into  the 
future  with  courage  and  confidence,  and  sees  God's 
purpose  working  itself  out  with  righteousness  and 
love,  as  the  dying  Joseph  gave  instructions  "  about 
his  bones."  As  the  gladiators  in  the  arena  ere  they 
began   to   fight   greeted   the   emperor   with   "  We 

176 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

dying  men  salute  thee,"  so  Abraham  and  the 
patriarchs  saw  from  afar  the  fulfilment  of  God's 
promises,  and  saluted  them  as  they  died  (xi.  13). 

It  has  already  been  noted  that  this  writer  men- 
tions the  resurrection  of  Jesus  only  in  his  closing 
benediction  (xiii.  20).  One  reason  is  just  that  to 
him  the  unseen  world  was  so  real  ;  he  did  not 
think  of  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  as  an  event.  To 
him  the  death  of  Jesus  was  only  the  parting  of 
the  veil,  which  in  His  case  had  hardly  hidden  the 
world  of  eternal  realities.  For  this  writer  the 
resurrection  of  men  of  faith  is  only  the  falling  of 
scales  from  their  eyes.  The  Maccabees  knew  that, 
and  had  no  fear  of  death,  not  even  of  death  in  its 
most  excruciating  forms  ;  because  the  life  that 
lay  beyond  it  was  better  than  the  short  protraction 
of  an  earthly  career  to  be  bought  by  the  surrender 
of  truth  and  honour.  There  is  the  same  inter- 
pretation as  Jesus  gives  of  "  I  am  .  .  .  the  God 
of  Abraham,  and  the  God  of  Isaac,  and  the  God  of 
Jacob  "  (Ex.  iii.  6  ;  Mark  xii.  27  ;  Heb.  xi.  16). 
Here  as  elsewhere  the  author  reads  back  the  ideas 
of  a  later  time  into  the  story  ;  but  is  not  the  faith 
of  which  it  tells  us  all  the  greater  just  because 
they  had  not  then  the  fuller  light  of  later  days  ? 
Abraham  going  forth,  "  not  knowing  whither  he 
went,"  is  the  father  of  the  faithful  of  all  ages.  He 
went  into  the  unknown,  yet  to  him  it  was  not 
unknown,  for  he  knew  that  God  was  there. 

For  sheer  spiritual  power  these  glowing  verses 

177  M 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

are  among  the  most  treasured  possessions  of  the 
Church.  The  chapter  records  a  glorious  apostoli- 
cal succession  of  men  and  women,  who  in  many 
cases  held  no  office,  and  enjoyed  no  title  but  the 
title  of  their  own  faith.  Great  as  they  were,  they 
can  do  nothing  for  us  but  leave  us  their  shining 
example.  The  writer  tacitly  rejects  any  idea  that 
these  can  "  intercede "  for  us.  All  through  the 
chapter  too  we  can  read  between  the  lines  the 
author's  fixed  conviction  of  the  divine  purpose 
that  runs  through  the  ages — the  "  promise  "as  he 
calls  it — a  purpose  that  needs  its  human  instruments, 
and  which  no  "  accident,"  no  "  catastrophe,"  and 
no  human  will  can  thwart.  The  spiritual  value  of 
this  chapter  is  independent  of  the  results  of  critical 
investigation  of  the  narratives.  The  question  is 
not  whether  the  incidents  happened  as  the  Old 
Testament  writers  said  they  happened,  but  whether 
their  interpretation  of  life  is  a  correct  interpreta- 
tion. It  will  always  be  that  some  worship  while 
others  doubt  ;  the  narratives  have  to  be  read  in 
the  light  of  the  same  faith  in  which  they  were 
written  ;  here,  as  always,  the  pure  in  heart  shall 
see  God. 

The  faith  of  the  Old  Testament  saints  was,  in 
one  aspect  of  it,  a  vivid  realisation  of  the  unseen  ; 
in  another,  and  not  less  important,  aspect  it  was 
a  confident  hope  in  the  future.  That  hope  con- 
tinued throughout  the  centuries  to  inspire  the 
men  of  faith  ;    but  age  after  age  its  realisation  was 

178 


The  Cloud  of  Witness -Bearers 

postponed.  Some  great  historical  vindication  of 
the  hope  was  needed.  Until  Christ  came  it  was 
always  open  to  men  of  the  world  to  say  that  the 
patriarchs  should  have  gone  home  again  ;  that 
Moses  should  have  stayed  in  the  Egyptian  Court  ; 
that  the  Maccabees  should  have  submitted  and 
died  in  their  beds.  This  writer,  though  he  does 
not  expatiate  on  it,  shares  to  the  full  the  New 
Testament  conviction  that  Jesus  Christ,  God's  full 
and  final  revelation  to  men,  and  especially  His 
triumph  over  death,  is  the  answer  to  all  our  spiritual 
problems. 


*79 


CHAPTER   XIV 

THE  BIRTHRIGHT  OF  SUFFERING 
(xii.   1-29) 

In  this  writer's  finest  flights  of  poetry  or  eloquence 
he  is  never  just  a  poet  or  an  orator,  as  in  his 
speculations  he  is  never  just  a  philosopher.  We 
sometimes  speak  of  the  "  practical  interludes  "  in 
this  epistle  ;  it  might  be  nearer  the  truth  to  speak 
of  the  "  theoretical  interludes,"  though  neither 
expression  would  be  quite  correct.  Whatever 
literary  method  the  author  is  adopting  at  any 
moment,  his  aim  is  always  the  same  :  to  give  his 
readers  a  firmer  grasp  of  the  unseen  realities,  to 
warn  them  of  the  danger  in  which  they  stand,  to 
remind  them  of  the  worth  of  the  prize  that  is  all 
but  slipping  from  their  grasp. 

xii.  1-4 

In  the  next  section,  while  he  follows  out  no  one 
metaphor  consistently,  he  is  thinking  generally  of 
athletic  contests.  We  get  glimpses  of  the  stadium, 
with  its  thronging  spectators,  the  competitors 
stripping  for  the  race,  the  course  stretching  far  in 
front   of  them,   the   prize   that   awaits   the  victor. 

180 


The    Birthright   of   Suffering 

We  can  see  them  running,  every  nerve  at  the 
strain,  every  eye  on  the  goal  ;  and  then,  as  the 
pace  begins  to  tell  and  only  those  in  perfect  training 
can  hold  out,  one  after  another  fainting  with 
exhaustion  and  dropping  out  of  the  race.  Another 
time  his  thoughts  are  rather  with  the  bloody  con- 
tests of  the  gladiators,  while  again  his  words  suggest 
a  race  such  as  that  of  our  "  harriers,"  with  the 
pacemaker  in  front  and  the  "  whipper-in  "  to  see 
that  no  one  lags  behind,  only  in  this  friendly  race 
all  are  to  be  whippers-in.  There  is  the  long 
march  too,  or  the  cross-country  run,  when  some 
go  lame  if  the  roads  are  rough,  and  with  sheer 
weariness  the  dispirited  runner  crumples  up. 

The  race-course  and  the  gladiatorial  show,  with 
their  strenuous  preparation,  their  straining  of 
muscle  and  nerve  and  heart,  their  forgetfulness  of 
all  but  the  prize,  their  fierce  struggles  that  test 
courage  and  grit  almost  more  than  physical  con- 
dition, are  just  about  the  last  spheres  of  life  to 
which  one  would  go  to  illustrate  our  modern 
conception  of  Christianity,  which  has  succeeded  so 
well  in  adjusting  itself  to  its  environment  that  there 
is  hardly  ever  a  conscious  jar.  Is  it  only  in  "  times 
of  transition,"  as  we  are  fond  of  calling  them, 
that  the  forces  of  faith  and  unfaith  are  locked  like 
this  in  deadly  embrace  ?  Has  the  world  of  business, 
politics,  social  life  and  domestic  life  really  been  so 
far  Christianised  that  these  costly  choices  are  no 
longer  called  for  ?     Or  is  it  just  that  on  the  modern 

181 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

organisation  of  society  we  are  all  so  bound  up  with 
each  other  in  nearly  all  the  relations  of  life  that 
what  is  everybody's  sin  is  nobody's  sin,  and  com- 
promise at  every  point  becomes  part  of  the  recog- 
nised ethic  ?  At  least  this  writer  makes  of  life  no 
sterner  a  business  than  Jesus  makes  of  it. 

More  than  once  in  the  previous  chapter  he  has 
spoken  of  the  heroes  of  faith  as  having  "  witness  " 
borne  to  them  (xi.  2,  4,  5,  39).  He  now  (xii.  1) 
thinks  of  them  rather  as  witness-bearers  (the  Greek 
word  he  uses  is  the  equivalent  of  our  "  martyr," 
and  is  apparently  beginning  to  have  something  of  its 
later  sense).  They  bear  witness  to  the  reality  and 
the  worth  of  the  spiritual  world.  As  the  author 
and  his  friends  run  their  race,  he  thinks  of  all  those 
victors  of  the  past  ringing  them  round,  not  so  much 
as  spectators,  rather  as  those  who  have  "  quitted  " 
themselves  like  men  in  the  similar  struggles  of 
their  own  day,  and  by  their  very  presence,  by 
the  memories  their  great  names  invoke,  give  new 
heart  to  those  of  a  later  generation.  As  the  school- 
boy on  "  sports  "  day  spends  his  last  ounce  of 
strength  for  the  honour  of  the  school,  all  the  more 
if  there  are  veterans  looking  on,  so  this  writer  bids 
his  readers  run  tirelessly  in  the  presence  of  the 
champions  of  other  days  for  the  honour  of  the 
household  of  faith.  Each  generation  that  has 
passed  since  then,  adding  its  honoured  names  to 
the  glorious  army  of  the  men  of  faith,  has  given 
new  strength  to  the  appeal. 

182 


The   Birthright   of   Suffering 

"  Let  us  strip,"  he  says  to  them.  "  Let  us 
fling  off  our  pride,  fear,  doubts.  Sin,  everything 
that  separates  us  from  God,  would  only  impede 
our  progress  as  a  flowing  robe  would  hinder  the 
runner.  The  course  is  in  front  of  us  ;  let  us  run 
with  grit.  Jesus  our  Captain  is  going  on  before  ; 
let  us  keep  our  eyes  fastened  on  Him,  looking 
neither  to  right  nor  left  (xii.  2).  He  held  out  on 
His  course,  a  course  that  ended  on  the  cross.  What 
troubles  you  is  that  Christians  are  a  despised 
race."  (To  say  nothing  of  the  agony  of  the  cross, 
it  was  the  most  shameful  death  the  Romans  could 
inflict.  As  Cicero  said,  the  very  name  of  cross 
was  unfit  for  the  thoughts,  the  eyes,  the  ears  of 
Roman  citizens.)  "  But  Jesus  thought  nothing  of 
the  disgrace,  and  now  He  has  taken  His  seat  at 
the  right  hand  of  God's  throne,  so  that  the  limitless 
resources  of  God's  grace  and  God's  power  are 
available  for  those  who  are  His." 

(The  author  speaks  of  the  cloud  of  witnesses 
"  set  around  us,"  "  the  course  set  in  front  of  us," 
'  the  joy  set  in  front  of  Jesus."  It  is  very  tempting 
to  think  that  he  means,  "  seeing  a  path  of  joy 
stretching  in  front  of  Him,  a  path  He  might  have 
trodden,  Jesus  deliberately  turned  aside  from  it 
and  chose  the  way  of  the  Cross."  This  "  course," 
too,  had  its  spectators,  not  applauding,  but  deriding. 
The  Greek  could  bear  this  construction  :  xii.  2,  3.) 

Seeing  his  pupils  dismayed  and  puzzled  by  their 
sufferings,  their  teacher  has  three  things  to  say  to 

183 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

them.  In  the  first  place  they  were  only  sharing  their 
Master's  lot  (xii.  3).  Almost  from  the  beginning 
of  His  ministry,  His  claims,  His  work  of  healing, 
His  message  of  the  kingdom,  had  been  met  by 
cruel  criticism,  by  sneers,  by  plots  against  His 
life,  and  finally  by  the  cross.  Further,  they  are 
not  pulling  their  full  strength  ;  they  have  not  yet 
put  their  whole  heart  into  the  struggle  with  the 
enemy  within  them  (xii.  4).  (Or,  if  "  blood  "  is 
to  be  taken  literally,  "you  have  not  yet  had  to 
shed  any  blood  in  your  struggle  against  the  sin  in 
the  world,  as  Jesus  and  your  predecessors  had 
to  do.") 

xii.  5-13 

Finally,  they  have  misconceived  the  whole  situa- 
tion. That  suffering  is  a  sign  of  God's  indifference 
or  hostility  is  a  heathen  view  (it  underlies,  for 
example,  the  Hindu  doctrines  of  "  karma "  and 
transmigration).  As  usual  he  turns,  not  to  any 
saying  of  Jesus,  but  to  an  Old  Testament  passage, 
in  this  case  to  words  evidently  written  at  a  time 
when  the  same  problem  faced  Jewish  thinkers 
(Prov.  iii.  11,12).  "  God's  discipline,"  says  Wisdom, 
or  a  sage  representing  Wisdom,  "  affects  different 
people  differently.  Some  men  meet  it  with  in- 
difference or  contempt  ;  they  call  their  sorrows 
'  troubles  '  and  regard  them  as  nuisances  to  be 
evaded  or  endured  with  a  minimum  of  discomfort. 
Others  collapse  under  them.  With  no  philosophy 
to  give  them  courage,  and  no  religion  to  let  them 

184 


The    Birthright   of   Suffering 

see  God's  hand  in  their  trials,  they  regard  them- 
selves as  helpless  victims  of  life.  What  we  call 
our  troubles  are  God's  fatherly  discipline,  a  sign 
not  that  God  has  forgotten,  but  that  God  is  remem- 
bering us."  Therefore  let  them  brace  up  their 
Courage  and  go  on  with  the  race.  If  they  walk 
in  crooked  ways  of  doubt  and  despondency  their 
weaker  brother  may  come  to  grief  altogether. 
Let  them  set  a  straightforward  example  of  courage 
and  endurance  (xii.  I2f.). 

xii.  14-17 

The  next  section  suggests  that,  as  so  often 
happens,  spiritual  sluggishness  was  accompanied, 
partly  as  cause,  partly  as  effect,  by  a  low  moral 
tone.  "  Let  every  man  of  you  be  as  a  bishop,' 
whose  care  it  is  to  see,"  in  the  words  in  which  Moses 
warned  his  people  against  idolatry,  "  that  there  be 
no  fellow-member  whose  heart  turneth  away  this 
day  from  the  Lord  our  God."  It  is  not  only 
sexual  vice  he  has  in  mind,  though  he  includes 
that ;  he  is  thinking  rather  of  the  spirit  of  Esau, 
who,  with  all  his  virtues,  became  the  very  type  of 
the  man  brought  up  in  pious  surroundings  who 
is  essentially  irreligious.  Esau  not  only  showed 
a  childish  lack  of  self-restraint,  but  by  his  choice 
became  the  Captain  of  Non-Faith,  the  leader  of  the 
spiritually  blind. 

Far  from  having  a  confident  vision  of  the  distant 
future,  Esau  cannot  even  look  forward  an  hour  or 

185 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

two.  The  man  of  faith  dwells  in  the  unseen 
world.  Esau  virtually  denied  the  existence  of 
a  spiritual  world  ;  for,  as  seen  at  least  by  later 
ages,  the  "  birthright  "  he  sold  so  cheaply  included 
the  privilege  that  God's  purpose  of  grace  for 
mankind  should  run  through  his  line.  This  Stoic 
Puritan  will  not  waste  a  word  of  sympathy  on 
Esau,  whose  story  is  surely  one  of  the  most  moving 
in  literature.  Esau's  decision,  says  the  author, 
was  final  ;  not  all  his  tears  of  remorse  could  wash 
out  a  line  of  what  he  had  written.  Thus  does  he 
reiterate  the  conviction  already  twice  expressed — 
a  conviction  which  at  least  gives  to  life  a  serious- 
ness and  dignity  it  so  often  lacks — that  however 
much  we  may  hate  and  despise  ourselves  for  the 
seed  we  have  sown,  yet  the  seed  will  bear  its  crop. 
Life  does  not  treat  us  with  the  levity  with  which 
we  so  often  treat  life.  Many,  like  Jonah,  get  a 
second  chance  ;  but  in  life  as  we  know  it  there 
are  multitudes  who  have  to  abide  by  their  decisions 
and  make  the  best  of  them. 

xii.  18-24 

Is  the  second  covenant  then,  like  the  first,  a 
covenant  of  doom  ?  The  author  raises  the  ques- 
tion as  he  seems  in  fancy  to  hear  his  readers  raising 
it.  "  On  the  contrary,"  he  replies,  "  they  have 
nothing  in  common  but  the  penalty  of  rejection. 
All  the  accompaniments  of  the  first  covenant  were 
such    as    to    terrify   and    repel.     Contrast   all    this 

186 


The   Birthright  of   Suffering 

with  the  order  that  Jesus  introduces.  You  have 
come  not  to  Sinai,  but  to  Zion  ;  to  no  spot  on  a 
map,  but  to  the  city  which  to  find  is  to  find  God. 
It  is  the  city  which  throughout  the  ages  God  has 
been  preparing  for  men  of  faith,  the  heavenly 
Jerusalem  which  will  fulfil  the  dreams  that  men 
dreamt  of  the  holy  city  of  the  Jews  ;  the  city  not 
of  the  death-dealing  God  of  the  Old  Covenant,  but 
of  the  God  who  lives  and  imparts  life. 

"  This  time  the  '  drawing  near  '  is  a  reality  ; 
there  is  no  '  hands  off '  sign  over  Zion.  The 
congregation  that  you  join  is  no  crowd  of  fugi- 
tive, frightened,  conscience-stricken  slaves.  At  the 
giving  of  the  old  Law  there  were  myriads  of  angels 
present "  (at  least  the  writer  seems  to  have  had  this 
statement  in  his  version  of  Deut.  xxxiii.  2,  though 
the  passage  does  not  quite  mean  this,  even  in  the 
Greek).  "  At  Mount  Zion  you  will  meet  myriads 
of  angels  in  festal  array,  as  Jesus  Himself  once 
pictured  them  (Luke  xv.  10).  There  too  you  will 
meet  the  congregation  of  those  who  follow  Jesus 
like  yourselves."  They  have  inherited  Israel's  place 
as  God's  first-born  (Ex.  iv.  23).  They  will  never, 
like  Esau,  barter  away  for  any  earthly  prize  their 
privileges  as  God's  elder  sons  ;  their  names  are 
entered  on  the  roll  as  citizens  of  the  city  of  God  ; 
the  Judge  with  whom  it  lies  to  admit  or  exclude 
is  no  tribal  deity,  but  the  God  of  all. 

"  There  too  you  will  have  converse  with  the  good 
men   of  ages   gone   by,   perfected   and  satisfied   at 

187 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

last.  You  will  meet  too  with  Him  who  has  made 
all  this  possible,  who  has  led  us  to  God,  who  has 
done  so  effectively  for  the  New  Covenant  the  work 
of  mediation  that  Moses  did  so  ineffectively  for 
the  Old  Covenant  ;  you  will  meet  Jesus.  The 
blood  of  Abel  called  for  the  ostracism  of  Cain  ; 
the  blood,  the  offered  life  of  Jesus,  opens  up  man's 
way  to  God." 

xii.  25-29 

The  measure  of  the  graciousness  of  the  New 
Covenant  as  compared  with  the  former,  of  the 
pure  and  happy  spiritual  fellowship  to  which  it 
calls,  is  the  measure  also  of  the  added  responsibility 
of  those  to  whom  it  is  offered  (xii.  25).  The  author 
makes  a  characteristic  use  of  a  quotation  from  the 
prophecy  of  Haggai.  In  his  second  address  to 
the  people  on  the  occasion  of  the  rebuilding  of  the 
Temple,  to  which  the  prophet  was  urging  them, 
he  tries  to  encourage  them  by  telling  them  that 
their  oppressor,  the  Persian  Empire,  is  about  to 
be  overthrown.  God  is  about  to  "  shake "  the 
whole  world  and  the  nations  (ii.  6f.).  The  Greek 
translation  adds  the  word  "  again,"  which  implies 
a  previous  shaking,  which  this  author  finds  in  the 
earthquake  at  the  giving  of  the  Sinai  covenant. 

In  accordance  with  traditional  apocalyptic  expec- 
tations the  author  infers  from  the  prophecy  (or 
rather  he  uses  the  prophecy  as  a  peg  on  which  to 
hang  his  own  expectation)  |that  God  is  about  to 
intervene    in    a    world-shaking    "  catastrophe "    in 

188 


The    Birthright   of   Suffering 

which  all  merely  created  things,  as  belonging  to 
the  temporal  order,  will  disappear,  and  only  the 
world  of  eternal  reality  will  remain.  God's  king- 
dom (he  here  falls  back  on  Jesus'  favourite  designa- 
tion of  the  coming  ideal)  cannot  be  shaken  ;  "  My 
kingdom  is  not  of  this  world  "  (John  xviii.  36). 
"  Let  us  receive  this  kingdom  with  gracious  thanks, 
and  so  render  to  God  the  only  worship  which 
pleases  Him  ;  with  reverence  such  as  Jesus  Him- 
self showed,  without  levity  or  familiarity,  but  with 
godly  fear  "  (xii.  28f.). 

There  is  a  gloomy  sternness  about  this  chapter 
that  is  apt  to  repel  a  generation  accustomed  to 
hear  God  pictured  as  a  weak,  indulgent  Father 
who  spoils  His  children.  The  writer  knew  as  we 
do  not  the  men  to  whom  he  was  writing,  and  the 
wise  preacher  puts  the  emphasis  where  it  is  most 
needed.  The  gospel  that  Jesus  proclaimed  to  the 
outcast  tax-gatherers  and  "  sinners,"  when  preached 
to  men  who  are  neither  tax-gatherers  nor  "  sinners," 
may  easily  produce  sentimentalism,  irreverence, 
and  easy-going  morals.  The  love  of  God,  full  of 
tender  compassion  for  all  struggling,  tempted  souls, 
is  a  "jealous"  love,  which  takes  the  form  of  a 
"  consuming  fire  "  when  its  pleading  is  met  with 
indifference  by  self-satisfied  men  who  choose  to  go 
in  their  own  ignoble  way. 


189 


CHAPTER   XV 

THE  EMOLUMENTS  OF  THE  MINISTRY 
(xiii.  1-25) 

The  epistle  closes  with  some  practical  ethical  advice, 
in  a  form  with  which  Paul's  epistles  have  rendered 
us  familiar.  "  Let  love  of  the  Christian  brother- 
hood continue,"  that  loving  fellowship  which  had 
from  the  beginning  been  one  of  the  distinguishing 
marks  of  the  community,  and  which,  as  we  learn 
both  from  Lucian  and  Tertullian,  long  continued  to 
attract  the  attention  of  the  non-Christians  (xiii.  1). 

44  Do  not  forget  to  practise  hospitality  "  (xiii.  2) — a 
maxim  which  the  author  justifies,  not  on  the  ground 
that  they  who  do  a  kindness  to  the  needy,  however 
humble,  do  a  kindness  to  Jesus,  but  rather  with 
the  plea  that  some  hosts  have  unexpectedly  found 
they  were  entertaining  angels.  Even  in  this  argu- 
ment he  is  thinking  not  of  the  story  of  Zacchaeus 
or  of  Martha  and  Mary,  but  of  such  incidents  as 
that  of  Abraham  and  Lot  recorded  in  Genesis  xviii. 
and  xix.,  or  the  story  of  the  parents  of  Samson  in 
Judges  xiii. 

In  an  age  when  Christians  travelled  frequently 
on   Church  business  or  on  their  own  affairs,  the 

190 


The   Emoluments  of  the   Ministry 

question  how  to  find  a  lodging  in  a  strange  town 
would  continually  present  itself.  The  way  in 
which  idolatry  insinuates  itself  into  every  detail  of 
the  life,  especially  into  food  questions,  would  make 
it  in  many  places  advisable,  if  not  as  imperative  as 
in  modern  India,  for  Christians  to  live  only  with 
Christians.  The  public  inns  had  their  temptations 
for  men  and  their  dangers  for  women,  as  well  as 
the  public  serais.  Hence  hospitality,  especially  to 
travelling  Christians,  became  as  prominent  a  virtue 
among  the  early  Christians  as  in  the  mission 
Churches  of  our  own  day.  The  author  assumes 
that  his  readers  are  already  practising  this  virtue, 
and  asks  only  that  they  do  not  lower  their 
standards. 

One  of  the  splendid  chapters  in  the  early  history 
of  Christianity  is  that  which  tells  of  the  loving 
attention  lavished  by  Christians  on  their  fellow- 
Christians  in  prison,  especially  those  imprisoned 
for  the  faith — a  practice  which  partly  owed  its  origin 
to  the  teaching  of  Jesus  in  Matthew  xxv.  35$". 
and  partly  was  a  natural  expression  of  Christian 
feeling.  Gaolers  were  even  bribed  to  allow  Chris- 
tians access  to  fellow-Christian  prisoners,  and  some- 
times gaolers  were  so  impressed  that  of  their  own 
accord  they  allowed  Christians  to  communicate 
with  their  friends  in  gaol.  Origen  in  his  youth, 
like  Dinah  Morris  in  a  later  day,  stayed  by  con- 
demned Christians  till  they  reached  the  place  of 
execution.     These  practices  the  author  commends 

191 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

to  his  readers.  "  Remember  prisoners  as  if  you 
were  in  prison  with  them,  the  persecuted  as  being 
yourselves  in  the  body  and  subject  to  like  trials  " 
(xiii.  3).1 

"  Let  marriage  be  held  in  honour  among  all,  and 
let  wedlock  be  kept  pure  "  (xiii.  4).  If  there  is  any 
reference  here  to  ascetic  disparagement  of  marriage 
(1  Tim.  iv.  3)  that  is  not  the  prominent  thought. 
"  For  God  will  judge  all  breaches  of  marriage  law, 
whether  within  or  without  the  marriage  relation- 
ship." The  demand  for  absolute  moral  purity  in 
sexual  relations  was  from  the  beginning,  and  still 
is  wherever  Christianity  spreads,  a  distinguishing 
mark  of  the  religion.  Very  early  in  the  history 
of  the  Church  exaggerated  demands  for  moral 
purity  gave  rise  to  those  ascetic  ideals  that  pro- 
duced the  monastic  system,  which  for  good  or  evil 
played  so  large  a  part  in  the  life  of  the  mediaeval 
Church. 

"  Let  love  of  money  have  no  place  in  your 
character  "  (xiii.  5),  a  maxim  which  in  one  form  or 
other  was  constantly  on  the  lips  of  Jesus — advice 
particularly  appropriate  for  men  who  at  any  moment 
might  be  despoiled  of  all  their  possessions. 
"  Contentment  with  what  you  have  "  was  taught 
by  Jesus  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  ;  here  it 
is  urged  on  the  same  ground  :  God  will  take  care 
of  His  children  as  well  as  of  the  birds  and  flowers. 
As  usual,  the  author  makes  no  reference  to  the  words 

•  Harnack,  Expansion  of  Christianity,  English  translation,  I.  20iff. 

192 


The   Emoluments   of  the   Ministry 

of  Jesus,  but  finds  his  text  (xiii.  6)  in  the  Old 
Testament,  in  the  passage  in  which  Moses  promises 
his  people  God's  help  in  the  conquest  of  Canaan. 
"  I  will  not  desert  you  nor  abandon  you  "  (Deut. 
xxxi.  6,  8).  "  We  may  then,  in  the  words  of  the 
Psalmist,  exulting  after  a  military  victory,  exclaim  : 
4  God  is  my  helper  ;  I  shall  not  fear.  What  can 
man  do  to  me  ?  '  "  (Psa.  cxviii.  6). 

Next,  apparently  with  some  recollection  of  a 
passage  in  the  "  Wisdom  of  Solomon  "  that  deals 
with  the  bearing  of  a  righteous  man  in  the  face  of 
persecution  and  death,  he  tells  them  (xiii.  7)  to  call 
to  mind  their  former  "  leaders  "  (as  usual  he  calls 
them  by  no  more  official  title).  These  leaders 
earned  their  gratitude  by  proclaiming  to  them 
the  Gospel  of  God's  word.  They  died  like  men 
(possibly  a  martyr's  death).  They  were  men  of 
that  vision  which  in  this  epistle  is  called  "faith." 
It  would  be  well  if  the  readers  were  like  them. 

Christian  belief,  and  in  a  measure  Christian  prac- 
tice, vary  from  age  to  age  :  Jesus  Christ  Himself 
never  varies  (xiii.  8).  He  is  "  the  same  yesterday" 
(in  the  days  of  His  flesh,  or  perhaps,  in  His 
pre-incarnate  days),  "  and  to-day "  (the  present 
day  of  grace)  "  and  for  ever  "  (after  the  dissolution 

Iof  all  earthly  things).  This  memorable  tribute  to 
the  unchanging  Christ,  which  may  be  taken  from 
a  creed  formula  of  the  day,  introduces  a  section  to 
which  the  author  obviously  attaches  importance, 
but  to  which  unfortunately  we  have  lost  the  key. 

193  N 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

xiii.  9-16 

He  is  warning  against  various  novel  theories, 
and  urging  that  grace  makes  a  better  nourishment 
for  the  heart  than  "  foods."  "  Our  altar,"  he  says, 
"  is  one  of  which  those  who  minister  at  the  taber- 
nacle "  (still  using  the  language  of  ancient  Jewish 
ritual,  and  meaning  either  worshippers  or  priests) 
"  have  no  right  to  eat."  In  his  discussion  of  the 
question  of  a  paid  ministry  Paul  had  used  a  phrase 
almost  exactly  similar  (1  Cor.  ix.  4,  13).  Paul 
had  employed  as  an  argument  for  the  support  of 
a  missionary  by  the  Church  he  founds,  the  fact 
that  "  men  whose  work  is  the  service  of  the  temple 
ritual  eat  of  the  temple  sacrifices."  How  would 
the  argument  sound  on  the  assumption  that  this 
author  uses  the  words  with  the  same  meaning  ? 

"  Some  of  you  think  too  much  about  food,  too 
little  about  grace.  Men  who  are  always  thinking 
of  their  salary  get  little  benefit  from  their  anxiety. 
It  is  true  that  under  the  old  ritual  the  priests  had 
their  perquisites,  which  included  (according  to 
Num.  xviii.  8ff.)  all  things  offered  in  sacrifice, 
except  in  so  far  as  they  were  burnt.  This  exception 
however  covered  the  case  of  the  sacrifice  on  the 
Day  of  Atonement.  The  animals  offered  alike  for 
high  priest  and  people  are  so  '  holy  '  that  it  would 
be  dangerous  for  the  priests  to  eat  them  ;  and  so, 
after  their  blood  is  offered,  their  carcases  are  burnt 
'  outside  the  camp  '  (Lev.  xvi.  27).  The  sacrifice 
on    the    Day  of  Atonement   is    the   very    offering 

194 


The   Emoluments   of  the   Ministry 

which  foreshadowed  the  one  Christian  sacrifice. 
Even  in  the  detail  just  mentioned,  the  sacrifice  of 
Jesus  was  true  to  its  parabolic  form.  Jesus,  the 
great  New  Testament  sacrifice,  that  He  might 
sanctify  the  people  through  His  own  blood,  though 
it  is  true  His  body  was  not  burnt,  yet  suffered 
outside  the  camp,  outside  the  Holy  City."  The 
ancient  rule,  based  doubtless  on  fear  of  defilement, 
that  executions  should  take  place  outside  the  city, 
worked  into  God's  purpose,  as  did  the  advice  of 
Caiaphas  (John  xi.  49—52). 

There  are  no  perquisites,  then,  for  followers  of 
Jesus,  but  only  shame  and  ostracism.  "  Let  us  go 
forth  to  Him  "  (xiii.  13),  "  outside  the  camp,  outside 
the  range  of  all  those  interests  and  ambitions  that 
other  men  call  life,  carrying  His  reproach,  even  as 
He  went  forth  carrying  His  cross"  (John  xix.  17). 
"  These  pecuniary  thoughts  would  be  in  place  for 
men  who  were  to  live  for  ever  as  men  of  the  world  ; 
but  our  citizenship  is  in  the  world  to  come." 
(That  Christians,  like  the  patriarchs,  only  seek  after 
the  city  is  one  more  proof  that  for  the  author  the 
"  coming  age  "  has  not  yet  fully  come.) 

This  interpretation  rises  naturally  out  of  the 
discussion  of  the  ritual  regulations  that  form  the 
text  of  so  large  a  part  of  the  epistle,  and  is  in 
harmony  with  the  warning  against  love  of  money 
in  xiii.  5.  It  may  help  also  to  explain  the  advice 
(xiii.  16)  to  the  readers  to  be  willing  to  share  what 
they  had,  and  it  is  compatible  with  the  directions 

i95 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

in  xiii.  17  :  "  Obey  your  spiritual  rulers  (even  if 
you  do  not  grant  all  their  claims)."  We  know 
too  from  1  Corinthians  ix.  that  such  questions 
arose  at  a  very  early  period  in  the  history  of  the 
Church.1 

(It  is  just  possible  that  the  passage  is  aimed 
against  a  literal  interpretation  of  "  This  is  My 
body,"  such  as  we  find  in  John  vi.  52 — an  inter- 
pretation which  has  played  so  large  a  part  in  the 
history  of  sacramentarianism.  This  does  not  seem 
to  suit  the  context  so  well.  Another  suggestion  is 
that  the  polemic  is  against  the  liberty  which  may 
have  been  claimed,  as  it  was  claimed  in  Corinth, 
for  Christians  to  partake  of  sacrificial  meals  of 
religions  other  than  their  own.) 

The  immediate  sequel  gives  support  to  the  idea 
that  the  question  at  issue  was  that  of  emoluments  for 
services  rendered  to  the  Church.  "  Through  Him 
(Jesus)  let  us  offer  a  sacrifice  of  praise  continually 
to  God"  (xiii.  15).  "Sacrifice  of  praise"  was  the 
technical  term  for  the  thankoffering  of  the  Levitical 
law.  In  Leviticus  vii.  I2f7.,  where  the  directions  for 
it  are  given,  the  priest's  portion  is  defined  with 
some  care.  The  phrase  is  used  by  the  author  of 
Psalm  lx.,  who  teaches  (3f.)  that  God  wants  real 
prayer  and  gratitude  instead  of  (or,  perhaps,  in 
addition  to)  animal  sacrifices.  As  Hosea  said 
(xiv.  3  in  the  Greek  version),  what  God  wants  is 
"  the  fruit  "  not  of  our  barnyards,  but  "  of  our  lips." 

1  Cf.  the  warning  in  i  Peter  v.  2. 
196 


The   Emoluments   of  the   Ministry 

In  Isaiah  lvii.  19  "  fruit  of  the  lips  "  seems  to  be 
used  almost  as  a  technical  term  for  thanksgiving. 
"  To  do  good,"  says  the  author,  as  Jesus  did  good 
(Acts  x.  38),  to  "share"  as  a  member  of  the 
Christian  commonwealth,  these  are  the  sacrifices 
that  will  win  God's  favour,  as  Abel's  did. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  Paul  acknowledges  a  gift 
from  the  Philippian  Christians  in  language  strik- 
ingly similar.  He  calls  it  "  an  acceptable  sacrifice, 
well-pleasing  to  God  "  (Phil.  iv.  18).  It  may  well 
be  that,  just  as  Paul  claimed  the  right  to  be  sup- 
ported by  the  Corinthian  Christians  and  then  chose 
to  earn  his  own  living,  this  writer,  while  denying 
the  claim  of  their  teachers  to  support,  yet  urges 
his  readers  to  make  voluntary  contributions.  (The 
support  of  prophets  and  teachers  by  "  first-fruits  " 
is  inculcated  in  Didache  xiii.).  Christ,  then,  as  well 
as  the  Levitical  high  priests,  had  something  to  offer, 
namely  Himself.  His  followers  also  have  something 
to  offer,  namely  "thanksgiving"  and  "generous 
kindness." 

Obedience  and  submission  to  their  present 
rulers  is  next  enjoined,  possibly  but  not  necessarily 
with  the  underlying  suggestion  that  there  had 
been  some  friction — obedience  to  their  authori- 
tative teaching,  submission  to  their  discipline. 
"  They  keep  sleepless  vigilance,  as  Jesus  told  His 
disciples  to  do  (Mark  xiii.  33),  but  for  your  souls, 
not  their  own,  as  men  who  know  they  will  have 
to  give  an  account  of  their  stewardship.     If  it  is 

197 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

a  pitiful,  not  a  joyful,  account  they  have  to  give,  so 
much  the  worse  for  you  "  (xiii.  17). 

Next,  as  Paul  sometimes  does  with  his  corre- 
spondents (Rom.  xv.  3of.  ;  1  Thess.  v.  25),  the 
author  asks  for  the  prayers  of  his  readers — their 
continued  prayers.  "  Anxious  in  all  things  to  live 
a  good  life,  I  persuade  myself  that  I  have  a  good 
conscience."  (Was  his  absence  from  them  con- 
nected with  some  charge  brought  against  him 
either  by  the  Christians  or  by  the  civil  power  ?) 
He  specially  desires  their  prayers  that  he  may  be 
speedily  restored  to  them  (xiii.  i8f.). 

In  the  concluding  prayer  (xiii.  2of.)  the  author 
has  in  mind  the  passage  in  Isaiah  lxiii.,  where  the 
prophet,  after  calling  to  mind  Jehovah's  redeeming 
love  for  His  people  ("  No  envoy  nor  angel  but 
Himself  saved  them,  because  He  loved  them  and 
spared  them  ;  Himself  redeemed  them  and  took 
them  up  and  bore  them  on  high  all  through  the 
age "),  recalls  how  Israel  rejected  His  love  and 
grieved  His  Holy  Spirit,  and  then  goes  on  to  sing  : 

"  Then  (Israel)  remembered 

The  days  of  the  old  time,  (and  said), 
'  Where  is  He  that  brought  up  from  the  sea 

The  shepherd  of  His  flock  ? 
And  where  is  He  that  set 

In  their  midst  His  holy  spirit  ? '" l 

A  sentence  in  the  Gospel  narrative  like  "  He 
had  pity  on  them  because  they  were  as  shepherd- 

1  Isa.  lxiii.  n.     (Isaiah  in  Modern  Speech,  by  J.  E.  McFadyen.) 
198 


The   Emoluments   of  the   Ministry 

less  sheep  "  (Mark  vi.  34)  doubtless  prepared  the 
way  for  the  Johannine  conception  of  Jesus  as  the 
Good  Shepherd,  even  if  there  had  been  no  more 
definite  traditional  basis  for  it. 

Surely  this  author  had  the  whole  apposite  passage 
of  Isaiah  in  mind  when  he  prayed  :  "  May  the 
God  of  peace  "  (of  the  safety  that  follows  God's 
victory  over  His  enemies)  "  who  has  brought  up," 
not  from  the  sea,  but  "  from  the  dead  "  (the  only 
direct  reference  in  the  epistle  to  the  resurrection 
of  Jesus),  not  the  shepherd  Moses,  but  "  that  great 
Shepherd  of  the  sheep,  Jesus  our  Lord,"  great  as 
a  shepherd  as  He  was  as  a  high  priest,  "  in  the 
potency  of  the  blood  of  the  eternal  covenant," 
which  was  the  theme  of  the  central  portion  of  the 
epistle,  (may  this  God)  "  equip  you  with  every 
requisite  to  do  His  will  "  (as  all  through  the  New 
Testament,  this  is  the  supreme  end  of  religion), 
"  effecting  in  you  through  Jesus  Christ,  to  whom 
be  glory  for  ever,  what  is  well-pleasing  to  Him." 
(As  in  Phil.  ii.  13,  the  divine  purpose  without 
human  co-operation  is  as  powerless  to  secure  men's 
salvation  as  the  human  will  without  divine  help.) 

Next  follows  a  modest  request  (v.  22)  that  they 
will  take  in  good  part  his  letter,  which,  quite  cor- 
rectly, though  contrary  to  the  common  impression  of 
its  nature,  he  describes  as  an  "  appeal " — a  word  of 
mingled  encouragement  and  warning.  His  descrip- 
tion of  it  as  a  brief  epistle  is  again  literally  correct, 
though  it  does  not  harmonise  with  the  impression 

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Through  Eternal  Spirit 

one  gets  from  a  study  of  the  literature  on  the 
epistle. 

11  I  have  to  tell  you  that  our  (Christian)  brother 
Timothy  has  been  set  free  "  (or  possibly  "  has  set 
out  ").  "  If  he  comes  soon,  I  shall  see  you  along 
with  him"  (xiii.  23) — a  sentence  which  has  raised 
the  question  :  If  he  was  to  be  present  with  his 
readers  in  person  so  soon,  why  this  elaborate 
epistle  ?  But  surely  in  any  case  his  message  was 
worth  committing  to  writing,  and  no  student  of 
the  epistle  will  suggest  that  verbal  supplements  by 
the  author  were  superfluous. 

"  Greet  the  leaders  and  the  members  of  all  the 
congregations  in  the  city  as  well  as  your  own.  The 
Italian  Christians  who  are  beside  me  send  their 
greetings.     May  grace  be  with  you  all  "  (xiii.  24^). 


200 


THE    EPISTLE    OF    JAMES 

CHAPTER   XVI 
A   PREACHER'S  TEXTS 

If  questions  of  Introduction  with  regard  to  the 
epistle  "  to  the  Hebrews "  are  difficult  or  impos- 
sible to  answer,  the  corresponding  questions  about 
11  The  Epistle  of  James  "  are  even  more  baffling. 
This  document  has  even  less  claim  to  be  called  an 
"  epistle  "  than  that  sent  "  to  the  Hebrews."  It 
closes  abruptly  with  no  salutations  of  any  kind. 
At  the  beginning  the  author  plunges  into  his 
subject  in  the  second  sentence,  and  almost  the 
only  indication  that  we  may  be  dealing  with  an 
"  epistle  "  is  the  opening  greeting,  which  consists 
of  less  than  two  lines.  This  greeting  is  sent  by 
11  James,  slave  of  God  and  of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ," 
and  is  addressed  to  "  the  twelve  tribes  in  the 
Dispersion  "  ;  which,  on  the  assumption  that  the 
document  is  sent  by  a  Christian  to  Christians, 
presumably  means  the  whole  scattered  Church  of 
Christ.  Moreover,  in  the  body  of  the  writing  there 
is  hardly  any  indication  that  the  author  has  in 
view  the  particular  circumstances  of  some  local 
community. 

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Through  Eternal   Spirit 

As  a  form  of  literature  the  "  epistle  "  had  had 
a  long  history  before  the  Christian  era,  and  it 
was  adopted  in  the  Church  almost  from  the  begin- 
ning. There  are  many  parallels  in  Paul's  epistles 
to  the  brief  practical  maxims  of  James  ;  but 
whereas  this  "  letter  "  is  wholly  composed  of  such 
maxims,  in  Paul's  writings  they  form  for  the  most 
part  an  appendix  to  the  epistle  proper.  The 
author  does  not  profess  to  be  an  apologete,  and 
only  in  a  very  minor  degree  is  he  a  thinker.  First 
and  last  he  is  a  preacher  ;  and  his  preaching  takes 
the  form  of  short,  pithy  utterances  of  concentrated 
experience.  It  is  true  that  his  maxims  tend  to  be 
arranged  in  groups,  and  that  within  each  group 
there  is  a  certain  consecution  of  ideas  ;  but  his 
preaching  is  always  rather  a  series  of  texts  than 
a  sermon. 

The  analogy  which  first  suggests  itself  is  that 
of  the  Jewish  "  Wisdom "  literature,  of  which 
"  Proverbs  "  is  the  best-known  example  ;  but  in 
"  James  "  there  is  little  of  that  careful  balancing 
of  parallel  or  contrasted  clauses  with  which  we  are 
familiar  in  "  Proverbs  "  ;  nor  in  this  book  does 
a  personified  Wisdom  talk  down  to  the  readers  as 
"  my  son."  The  writer  addresses  his  readers  as 
"  my  brothers,"  speaking  as  one  of  themselves. 
The  document  seems  to  belong  to  these  records  of 
popular  preaching  known  as  "  diatribes." 

About  the  author  nothing  is  certainly  known 
beyond  the  fact  that  he  calls  himself  James.     In 

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A  Preacher's  Texts 

view  of  the  tendency  of  the  early  Church  to  esti- 
mate the  importance  of  its  documents  by  the 
ecclesiastical  position  of  their  authors,  it  was 
natural  that  in  the  course  of  time  the  idea  should 
arise  that  this  James  was  the  Lord's  brother.  For 
that  belief  there  seems  to  be  no  evidence  of  any 
weight.  The  tradition  is  very  unconvincing,  and 
leaves  unanswered  the  question  :  If  this  "  letter  " 
was  really  written  by  a  brother  of  Jesus,  why  had 
it  so  long  and  difficult  a  passage  to  canonicity  ? 
Its  position  in  the  Canon  does  not  seem  to  have 
been  definitely  established  till  about  the  end  of  the 
fourth  century. 

As  for  the  evidence  of  the  "  letter  "  itself,  in 
our  almost  complete  ignorance  of  the  facts  we  may 
well  hesitate  to  say  dogmatically  that  a  brother  of 
Jesus  could  not  have  written  Greek  so  good  as  this 
(assuming  that  he  could  write  Greek  at  all)  ;  or 
that  one  who  knew  Jesus  intimately,  and  afterwards 
became  a  follower,  could  not  have  addressed  to 
the  Church  a  manual  of  instruction  in  which  Jesus 
is  left  so  much  in  the  background.  This  we  can 
say  however,  that  both  in  language  and  in  sub- 
stance the  "  epistle  "  is  largely  different  from  what 
we  should  have  expected  from  James,  the  Lord's 
brother,  in  his  Christian  days.  It  hardly  seems 
profitable  to  discuss  a  theory  for  which  the  historical 
basis  is  so  slender. 

Of  this  document  alone  among  New  Testament 
writings  is  it  possible  to  raise  the  question  whether 

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Through  Eternal  Spirit 

it  is  a  Christian  document  at  all.  We  are  all 
familiar  with  Luther's  verdict  that  it  is  a  "  right 
strawy "  epistle  on  the  ground  that  it  does  not 
"  preach  and  urge  Christ."  But  the  difficulty  is 
greater  than  that  ;  Jesus  is  hardly  mentioned  at 
all.  His  name  occurs  only  twice,  in  the  opening 
verses  of  the  first  two  chapters  ;  and  in  the  second 
of  these  references  the  grammar  is  so  unusual  and 
so  difficult,  the  sentence  would  read  so  much  more 
smoothly  if  it  were  left  out,  that  the  theory  that  it 
formed  no  part  of  the  original  writing  is  not  to  be 
turned  down  without  enquiry. 

Again,  when  the  author  wants  an  illustration  of 
patient  suffering,  he  turns  not  to  Jesus  but  to  Job. 
He  points  his  moral  of  the  power  of  prayer,  not 
from  the  teaching  of  Jesus,  but  from  the  example 
of  Elijah.  Outside  of  this  epistle  the  death  and 
resurrection  of  Jesus  may  be  said  to  form  the 
kernel  of  the  New  Testament  ;  neither  of  them  is 
mentioned  in  this  "  epistle."  There  is  no  clear 
indication  of  that  sense  of  indebtedness  to  Jesus 
which  so  filled  the  minds  of  Paul  and  the  authors 
of  "  Hebrews  "  and  "  i  Peter."  In  iv.  5  we  have 
the  only  reference  to  the  Holy  Spirit,  and  that  a 
doubtful  reference,  occurring  in  a  Scripture  quota- 
tion the  source  of  which  cannot  be  traced  and  the 
meaning  of  which  is  by  no  means  clear.  Some  of 
these  difficulties  may  have  explanations,  but  taken 
together  they  are  very  puzzling. 

One  has  to  grant  also  that  many  phrases  in  the 
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A  Preacher's  Texts 

"  letter  "  which  are  capable  of  a  Christian  inter- 
pretation are  ambiguous  and  are  equally  susceptible 
of  a  Jewish  interpretation.  The  Christian  "  syna- 
gogue "  (ii.  2),  which  presumably  means  a  Christian 
1  meeting,"  more  often  indicates  a  Jewish  "  place 
of  meeting."  "  James  "  does  not  use  the  word 
"  faith  "  in  any  distinctively  Christian  sense.  "  The 
perfect  law  of  freedom  "  (i.  25)  would  not  have 
been  an  impossible  phrase  in  the  mouth  of  a  pious 
Jew.  "  The  noble  name  which  is  called  over  you  " 
(ii.  7)  on  Christian  lips  would  be  the  name  of 
Jesus  ;  coming  from  a  Jew  the  phrase  would  be 
a  familiar  designation  of  God.  When  Paul  uses 
the  word  "  Lord "  it  is  sometimes  difficult  or 
impossible  to  know  whether  he  means  God  or 
Jesus.  In  "  James  "  we  cannot  be  quite  certain 
that  by  "  the  Lord  "  he  ever  means  Jesus.  When 
he  says  of  the  sick  man,  "  the  Lord  will  raise  him 
up"  (v.  15),  it  is  most  natural  to  suppose  that 
"  the  Lord  "  is  God.  If  we  assume  that  we  are 
dealing  with  a  Christian  document,  "  the  parousia 
of  the  Lord "  in  v.  8  presumably  refers  to  the 
second  coming  of  Jesus,  but  the  literature  seems 
to  suggest  thai  it  might  mean  "  the  coming  of  the 
Lord  of  Hosts  "  ;  and  in  verses  10  and  11  of  the 
same  chapter,  three  times  "  the  Lord  "  means  God. 
In  spite  of  all  this,  it  is  quite  incorrect  to  say 
that  our  belief  that  the  "  epistle  of  James  "  is  a 
Christian  document  depends  altogether  on  the 
phrase  in  the  opening  salutation,    "  a  slave  of  the 

205 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

Lord  Jesus  Christ."  The  writer's  maxims  con- 
stantly sound  like  echoes  of  the  teaching  of  Jesus, 
especially  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount.  His 
prohibition  of  oaths,  "  Let  your  '  yes '  mean 
1  yes  '  and  your  '  no  '  *  no  '  "  (v.  12),  may  well  be 
a  more  faithful  account  of  the  words  of  Jesus  than 
the  form  in  Matt.  v.  37  :  "  Let  your  language  be 
*  yes,  yes,'  '  no,  no.'  "  The  discussion  of  the 
relative  value  of  faith  and  works  does  not  seem  to 
be  satisfactorily  explained,  except  on  the  suppo- 
sition that  Paul's  exaltation  of  faith  and  depreciation 
of  ritual  "  works  "  had  in  some  circles  given  rise 
to  a  natural  but  unfortunate  misunderstanding. 

Our  conviction  that  the  author  is  a  Christian 
writing  for  Christians  is  based  not  only  on  the 
frequent  reminiscences  of  Jesus'  teaching,  but  on 
the  lofty  Christian  tone  which  is  sustained  through- 
out. There  seems  indeed  to  be  only  one  thought 
in  the  epistle  out  of  touch  with  the  mind  of  Jesus. 
In  iv.  14  the  readers  are  compared  to  "  a  vapour, 
appearing  for  a  little,  then  disappearing."  This 
sense  of  the  insignificance  of  life  corresponds  to 
one  strain  of  Old  Testament  thought  ;  but  it  is 
untrue  to  the  healthy  insistence  of  Jesus  on  the 
worth  and  dignity  of  life.  There  is  no  attempt  to 
reproduce  the  teaching  of  Jesus  in  its  many- 
sidedness.  We  are  in  the  atmosphere  of  the 
Sermon  on  the  Mount,  with  its  ethical  teaching 
and  its  frank  dealing  with  shams  ;  or  of  the 
denunciation  of  the  selfish  rich,  or  of  the  scribes 

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A  Preacher's  Texts 

and  Pharisees  ;  not  of  the  parable  of  the  prodigal. 
But  within  these  limits  we  have  the  work  of  a  virile 
mind  which  has  caught  the  spirit  of  Jesus,  of  that 
part  of  His  teaching  especially  which  did  so  much 
to  alienate  from  Him  the  men  of  influence  among 
His  people  and  to  bring  about  the  final  catastrophe. 

While  the  writer's  mind  is  steeped  in  Jewish 
thought  and  in  Christian  thought,  there  is  nothing 
whatever  to  suggest  that  he  was  in  the  technical 
sense  a  Jewish  Christian.  For  him  "  the  works 
of  the  law  "  are  a  moral  life,  not  adherence  to  a 
ritual.  There  is  no  trace  of  any  of  the  contro- 
versies that  arose  when  Gentiles  were  first  admitted 
to  the  Church.  It  would  seem  as  if  these  contro- 
versies had  never  arisen  for  writer  or  readers  (an 
impossible  supposition  if  the  author  had  been  a 
Jewish  Christian  leader  of  the  first  generation),  or 
else  they  had  been  settled  so  long  ago  and  so 
effectively  that  the  controversy  had  for  them  hardly 
even  an  historic  interest. 

Assuming  that  the  "  epistle "  was  written  by 
a  Christian  for  Christians,  the  comparative  lack  of 
unambiguous  references  to  Jesus  and  to  distinctively 
Christian  teaching  must  always  remain  something 
of  a  riddle.  Yet  in  this  respect  it  is  comparable 
to  many  Christian  sermons  preached  in  our  own 
day.  Moreover,  on  the  side  of  practical  ethics, 
which  alone  is  dealt  with  in  this  document,  Chris- 
tianity carried  on,  though  it  also  enriched  and 
deepened,  the  teaching  accepted — at  least  in  theory — 

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Through  Eternal   Spirit 

by  the  finer  types  of  Judaism.  Discussions  of  the 
nature  of  this  "  epistle  "  have  tended  to  proceed 
on  the  assumption  that  the  author  wrote  it,  so  to 
speak,  at  a  sitting.  Of  the  diatribe  of  all  forms 
of  literature,  this  can  never  be  a  correct  account. 
Such  a  production,  whatever  may  have  been  the 
time  occupied  in  the  actual  penmanship,  is  the 
result  of  long  years  of  experience  and  reflection, 
the  author's  ripe  wisdom  being  in  turn  indebted 
to  that  of  preceding  ages.  Even  if  author  and 
readers  were  alike  Christians,  it  may  well  be  that 
he  had  given  much  of  this  teaching  in  his  pre- 
Christian  days. 

Considerations  of  the  same  kind  are  often  for- 
gotten in  discussing  the  date  of  the  document. 
On  this  subject  opinions  of  the  widest  variety  have 
been  held,  the  date  being  placed  as  early  as  the 
middle  of  the  first  century  or  as  late  as  the  middle 
of  the  second.  Acceptance  of  a  very  late  date  is 
largely  determined  by  the  belief  that  the  religious, 
and  especially  the  social,  conditions  reflected  in 
"  James  "  are  such  as  could  not  have  arisen  in  any 
section  of  the  Church  in  the  first  or  second  Christian 
generations.  There  is,  we  are  told,  in  this  epistle 
no  sign  of  the  enthusiasm  of  a  Church  in  the 
raptures  of  its  first  love. 

Moreover,  the  prevalence  of  ambition,  of  strife — 
even  murderous  strife — of  the  unscrupulous  tyranny 
of  wealth  and  power  over  poverty,  are  all,  we  are 
told,   marks   of  an   age   of  decadent   Christianity. 

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The  evidence  of  contemporary  literature  is  also 
adduced  to  show  that  the  atmosphere  is  that  of 
the  middle  of  the  second  century  rather  than  of 
any  earlier  date.  Thus  in  the  Shepherd  of  Hermas 
(Vision  III.  ix.  6rT.)  we  read  :  "  See  to  it,  when 
you  rejoice  in  your  wealth,  that  the  destitute  may 
not  groan,  and  their  groans  go  up  to  the  Lord.  .  .  . 
Therefore  I  speak  now  to  the  leaders  of  the  Church 
and  to  those  '  who  take  the  chief  seats  '.  .  .  .  You 
are  hardened  and  will  not  cleanse  your  hearts. 
See  to  it  therefore,  children,  that  these  disagree- 
ments do  not  rob  you  of  your  life.  .  .  ." 

These  arguments  are  not  very  convincing.  The 
New  Testament  does  not  contradict  the  evidence 
of  modern  missionary  experience,  that  a  young 
Church  is  not  always  an  enthusiastic  Church. 
Moreover,  the  heartless  rich  men  whom  James 
denounces  are  not  necessarily  Christians.  Even 
if  the  "  letter  "  were  written  by  a  Christian  for 
Christians,  the  writer  was  not  debarred,  any  more 
than  Jesus  was,  from  using  accumulated  experience. 
There  is  no  need  to  suppose  that  the  sins  he  dis- 
cusses were  specially  characteristic  of  any  branch 
of  the  Church,  much  less  of  the  whole  Church  of 
the  age.  Even  if  he  had  concrete  cases  in  view, 
the  example  of  Corinth  is  sufficient  to  show  that 
a  low  moral  standard  does  not  always  imply  a  long 
Christian  past,  nor  is  it  easy  to  see  why  anyone 
should  suppose  that  it  does.  Perhaps  the  most 
that  we  can  say  is  that  the  supposition  of  a  late 

209  o 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

date  accounts  for  more  of  the  phenomena  than  that 
of  an  earlier  date. 

The  history  of  the  epistle  does  not  shed  much 
light  on  the  subject,  since,  while  there  are  parallels 
to  "  James  "  as  early  as  Clement  of  Rome  (in  the 
middle  of  the  last  decade  of  the  first  Christian 
century),  the  question  rises  which  was  indebted  to 
the  other  or  whether  both  were  indebted  to  some 
common  source.  The  first  definite  reference  to 
the  epistle  seems  to  come  from  Origen  in  the  third 
century.  All  that  it  seems  safe  to  say  is  that  the 
document  is  an  ethical  tractate,  written  by  a  Greek- 
speaking  Christian  teacher  who  had  been  brought 
up  in  a  Jewish  atmosphere  but  had  some  acquaint- 
ance with  Hellenistic  literature,  and  that  it  was 
addressed  to  the  scattered  Christian  Church. 


aio 


CHAPTER   XVII 
THE  TONGUE  AND  OTHER  PERILS 

If  the  epistle  of  James  had  great  difficulty  in  estab- 
lishing its  place  in  the  Canon  and  was  long  looked 
at  askance,  it  stands  there  now  in  its  own  right. 
It  is  the  work  of  a  brave,  strong  mind,  with  a  type 
of  religion  altogether  sane  and  wholesome.  The 
leaders  of  the  Church  recognised  from  the  first 
that  Christianity  was  not  only  a  faith,  but  a  faith 
issuing  in  a  life.  James,  while  accepting  the  faith, 
concentrates  on  the  life.  One  can  imagine  that 
he  might  have  found  himself  somewhat  out  of 
place  at  a  conference  on  the  reunion  of  Christen- 
dom, when  he  found  that  the  principal  subjects  of 
discussion  were  "  faith  "  and  "  order,"  neither  of 
which,  if  we  may  judge  from  this  product  of  his 
pen,  had  any  fascination  for  him. 

Yet  if  Christianity  is  ever  to  find  a  basis  of 
reunion,  it  is  much  more  likely  to  be  the  simple 
faith  and  difficult  ethic  of  James  than  any  inter- 
pretation of  Pauline  theology  or  of  the  creeds,  that 
relegates  to  a  subordinate  position  the  Christian 
life,  which  is  the  only  justification  of  our  creeds 
and  our  organisation.     This  manly  piece  of  ripe 

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Through  Eternal   Spirit 

wisdom  should  make  a  special  appeal  to  the  piety 
of  the  youth  of  our  day,  impatient  as  it  so  often 
is*of  irrelevant  discussions  that  lead  nowhere  ;  and 

OS 

it  is  unfortunate  that  the  form  in  which  the 
"  epistle  "  is  cast — an  obsolete  form,  like  that  of 
most  of  the  New  Testament  writings — is  a  hin- 
drance to  a  ready  appreciation  of  its  message. 

Considerations  of  space  make  it  impossible  to 
do  more  than  reproduce  some  of  the  leading  thoughts 
of  the  "  epistle." 

"  Do  not  call  your  trials  '  troubles.'  Receive 
them  with  a  cheer.  They  are  really  '  trials,'  tests 
of  character.  A  genuine  faith  in  God  will  help 
you  to  meet  them  with  that  steadfastness  with- 
out which  there  can  be  no  all-round  character  " 
(i.  2-4,  12). 

•  •  *  •  • 

"  Life,"  says  James,  "  is  a  difficult  business." 
He  modestly  suggests  the  possibility  that  someone 
may  lack  "  wisdom,"  an  intelligent  appreciation  of 
the  problems  of  life  and  how  they  are  to  be  met. 
James  knows  very  well  that  we  all  lack  this  wisdom. 
"  God  alone  can  give  us  the  light  we  need  to  guide 
us  among  the  pitfalls  of  life.  To  live  without 
prayer  and  without  God,  seeking  none  of  the  help 
that  God  is  so  ready  to  give,  especially  through  His 
Word,  is  to  stumble  along  a  dark  and  dangerous 
road  without  a  lamp."     This  "  epistle  "  reminds 

212 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

us  that  God  often  uses  intermediaries  in  bestowing 
His  gift  of  wisdom — a  student  of  life  and  of  the 
Word  like  James,  for  example.  Those  who  sever 
their  connection  with  the  visible  Church  of  Christ 
are  in  effect  intimating  that  they  feel  no  need  of 
the  help  of  a  teaching  ministry  (i.  5-8,  16-18). 


Is  goodness  worth  while  ?  It  is  a  question 
which  we  are  often  told  we  have  no  right  to  ask, 
but  which  every  normally  constituted  man  will  ask 
nevertheless,  and  which  the  New  Testament  con- 
sistently treats  as  a  reasonable  question.  Are  we 
living  in  a  world  based  on  goodness,  or  is  goodness 
an  alien  in  the  universe,  engaged  in  an  unequal 
contest  with  the  constitution  of  things,  and  fore- 
doomed to  failure  ? 

"  God  is  a  whole-hearted  giver  who  comes  to 
the  help  of  our  weakness  and  never  taunts  us  with 
the  gift."  With  the  simplicity  of  Jesus  Himself, 
James  is  convinced  that  nothing  that  is  not  good, 
no  imperfect  gift,  can  come  from  God.  The  God 
in  whom  James  believes  will  never  mock  us,  giving 
us  a  stone  for  a  loaf  or  a  serpent  for  a  fish.  It  is 
His  joy  to  satisfy  our  worthy  longings  and  fulfil 
our  noble  aspirations.  The  world  of  that  age — as 
indeed  of  most  ages — lived  in  fear  of  the  stars. 
"  God  is  the  Father  of  the  heavenly  bodies.  They 
wax  and  wane,  are  overshadowed  and  cast  shadows, 
symbols  of  the  change  and  shadow  that  pervade 

213 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

our  lives.  But  God  abides,  the  same  yesterday, 
and  to-day  and  for  ever."  Whatever  else  may  be 
said  of  this  faith,  James,  like  Jesus,  knew  the  facts 
of  life  that  make  it  difficult  to  hold  it.  He  knew, 
for  example,  that  the  unscrupulous  rich  man  often 
seems  master  of  the  situation  ;  but  with  patience 
we  shall  see  that  God  is  watching  and  biding  His 
time  (i.  5-8,  17  ;   v.  1-7). 

"  God  will  have  no  half-hearted  men.  You 
must  trust  Him  and  follow  Him,  all  in  all  or 
not  at  all.  The  man  who  believes  in  God  '  to  a 
certain  extent,'  the  '  semi-Christian,'  can  never  live 
a  purposeful  life.  Having  no  goal,  he  never  '  gets 
anywhere.'  God  wants  the  clean  in  hand,  the 
pure  of  heart,  the  man  who  will  trust  God  though 
He  slay  him."  The  ideal  of  Jesus  too,  was  the 
life  with  the  rock  foundation,  the  ploughman  who 
ploughs  with  his  eye  on  the  mark.  But  did  James 
know  of  Jesus'  belief  in  the  efficacy  of  faith  as 
a  grain  of  mustard-seed  ;  of  His  response  to  "  I 
believe;  help  my  unbelief"?  Did  he  realise 
the  significance  of  the  pagan  reproach  of  the 
Christians  that  their  Gospel  was  for  the  unclean 
of  hand  and  the  impure  of  heart  ?  (i.  6-8  ;  iv.  8). 

"  When  we  are  tempted  to  sin,  it  is  unmanly  to 
blame  God  "  (we  should  add  "  or  to  blame  society 
or   heredity ").     "  There    is    no    point    of   contact 

21  ± 


The  Tongue  and  Other  Perils 

betwen  God  and  evil.  God  is  light,  and  in  Him 
is  no  darkness  at  all.  Whatever  the  philosophy 
of  temptation  may  be,  in  the  last  resort  every 
honest  man  recognises  that  temptation  is  what  he 
makes  of  it.  To  allow  temptation  to  lure  us  out 
of  our  stronghold  is  to  commit  moral  suicide. 
Desire  yielded  to  is  the  mother  of  Sin  ;  Sin  come 
to  maturity  is  the  mother  of  death  "  (i.  13-15). 

11  Every  man  should  be  a  good  listener  "  ;  should 
be  willing  to  listen  to  explanations,  to  petitions,  to 
both  sides  of  a  question,  to  wiser  men  than  him- 
self (i.  19). 

"  Righteous  indignation  is  usually  self-decep- 
tion "  (i.    19,  20). 

11  Fine  words  are  not  enough.  Pious  talk  puts 
no  coat  on  the  poor  man's  back  and  no  food  in  his 
larder"  (i.  22-25  »   "•  I4~I7)- 

"  God's  law  is  an  imperial  law,  meant  for  free- 
men, not  for  slaves.  We  cannot  live  it  unless  we 
give  to  it  earnest,  concentrated  study,  not  a  passing 
occasional  glance  such  as  a  man  gives  to  his  own 
face  in  a  mirror  "  (i.  22—25). 

"  Fine  worship  is  not  enough.  The  true  wor- 
ship consists  in  being  kind  to  widows  and  orphans, 

215 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

and  in  keeping  oneself  from  the  defilements  of  the 
world  " — a  "  world  "  which  has  come  to  mean 
the  elements  in  life  that  are  hostile  to  God.  James 
does  not  discuss  the  relation  of  this  conception  of 
the  world  to  temptation  (i.  26,  27). 


"  A  fine  appearance  is  no  guarantee  of  worth. 
If  you  insult  a  poor  man  who  comes  to  visit  your 
Christian  meeting,  and  toady  to  another  visitor 
who  is  obviously  well-to-do,  you  are  forgetting  one 
of  the  fundamental  principles  of  Christianity. 
According  to  the  teaching  of  Christianity  "  (alone, 
it  is  claimed,  of  all  religions),  "  God  has  actually 
chosen  the  poor  as  heirs  of  the  kingdom."  In 
Corinth,  and  presumably  in  many  of  the  other 
Churches,  the  first  congregations  were  apparently 
largely  composed  of  slaves,  freedmen,  and  the 
poor  (ii.   1-9). 

Do  we  find  it  much  easier  to-day  than  they  did 
in  the  days  of  James  to  turn  a  blind  eye  to  the 
rich  man's  gold  ring,  or  its  modern  equivalent,  the 
cheque-book  ;  to  the  tattered  raiment  of  the  poor 
man,  or  its  modern  equivalent,  the  "  copper " 
collection  ?  The  Church  has  in  some  measure 
caught  the  spirit  of  the  Master.  Perhaps  nothing 
in  the  life  of  the  Christian  Church  in  India 
impresses  the  Hindu  quite  so  much  as  the  sight 
of  converts  from  the  "  untouchable  "  classes  received 
in    the    Church    on    absolutely    equal    terms    with 

216 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

Brahmin  converts,  even  if  with  less  £clat.  There 
are  various  indications  in  the  New  Testament  of 
the  surprise  with  which  the  Jew  discovered  that 
the  racial  distinctions  he  drew  had  no  counterpart 
in  the  mind  of  God,  that  God  is  no  "  respecter  of 
persons."  The  power  to  study  other  men  with 
our  mental  vision  undistorted  by  the  externals  of 
their  lives,  the  capacity  even  to  recognise  just  what 
of  the  things  that  attract  or  repel  us  in  others  are 
externals,  seems  to  be  one  of  the  last  achievements 
of  Christian  insight. 

"  We  must  not  pick  and  choose  among  the 
commandments,  exaggerating  the  importance  of 
those  we  are  least  inclined  to  disobey.  The  law  is 
an  indivisible  whole.  A  breach  of  any  '  command- 
ment '  is  a  proof  of  unfaithfulness  to  the  imperial 
law  of  love"  (ii.  10-13). 

"  An  orthodox  creed  is  not  enough.  The  only 
creed  that  counts  is  that  which  expresses  itself  in  a 
righteous  life."  Apparently  Paul's  formula,  "  faith, 
not  works,"  had  led  to  antinomianism.  Whether 
James  was  conscious  of  the  fact  or  not,  the  position 
he  attacks  had  nothing  in  common  with  Paul's 
teaching.  By  "faith"  James  means  creed  ;  Paul's 
11  faith  "  was  a  surrender  of  the  soul  to  God  in 
Jesus.  By  "  works  "  Paul  means  the  demands  of 
the    law,    including    its    ritual    requirements  ;     for 

217 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

James  "  works "  are  Christian  conduct.  James 
has  only  one  test  of  orthodoxy,  usually  about  the 
last  test  the  Church  has  thought  of  applying  : 
What  kind  of  character  does  it  produce  ?  "  Creed 
divorced  from  conduct  is  a  corpse  as  much  as  a 
body  divorced  from  spirit."  Nor  will  James  allow 
the  plea  that  one  man  specialises  in  faith,  another 
in  conduct.  The  distinction  is  as  unreal  as  that 
commonly  drawn  between  the  devotional  spirit  of 
Mary  and  the  service  of  Martha  (ii.  14—26). 


"  Do  not  all  want  to  be  teachers."  The  teachers, 
who  were  not  exactly  officials,  played  a  large  part 
in  the  life  of  the  early  Church,  as  we  learn  even 
from  the  New  Testament.  The  respect  paid  to 
these  teachers,  and  the  fact  that  they  lived  at  the 
expense  of  the  Church,  doubtless  gave  the  position 
a  certain  attraction  in  the  minds  of  some.  Other 
aspirants  would  be  tempted  by  the  influence  that 
the  teacher  exercised  and  by  the  love  of  hearing 
the  sound  of  their  own  voices.  "  Only  shallow 
natures  will  enter  light-heartedly  on  the  work  of 
guiding  the  minds  of  others,  especially  on  life's 
deepest  questions.  Our  condemnation  if  we  fail 
is  in  proportion  to  our  responsibility  "  (iii.  1,  2). 
The  moral  standards  of  our  day  are  largely  formed 
by  school-teachers,  politicians,  and  journalists. 
Would  that  the  first  verse  of  this  third  chapter 
of  "  James  "  could   be  burned  into  the  minds  of 

218 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

all    who    arrogate    to    themselves    the    position    of 
teacher  1 


"  The  perils  of  the  teacher  are  only  a  special 
illustration  of  the  perils  of  the  tongue.  The 
tongue  is  an  infallible  indicator  of  the  state  of  the 
spiritual  health.  There  are  men  who  can  subdue 
every  passion,  but  who  cannot  subdue  their  tongues. 
A  foul  or  an  uncontrolled  tongue  is  like  a  fire,  fed 
by  the  flames  of  hell,  which  will  kindle  a  confla- 
gration the  limits  of  whose  destructive  capacity  no 
man  can  foresee.  The  tongue  is  an  anarchic 
power.  Its  poison  is  as  fatal  as  the  cobra's,  bringing 
death  to  purity,  to  peace,  to  reputation."  Words 
can  turn  faith  into  cynicism,  hope  into  despair,  love 
into  suspicion  and  malice. 

"  It  is  easy  when  we  pronounce  God's  name  to 
say  '  Blessed  be  He  !  '  as  the  Jews  do.  If  we 
curse  men  who  are  made  in  God's  image,  that, 
and  not  our  doxology,  shows  our  real  thought  oi 
God,  just  as  if  we  taste  brackish  water  we  know 
that  the  spring  from  which  it  comes  is  altogether 
foul."  Well  may  James  say  that  the  good  man  is 
an  unwilling  speaker  (i.  19  ;  iii.  6—12). 

James  has  nothing  to  say  of  the  power  of  the 
tongue  to  spread  truth,  to  inspire  hope  and  courage. 
He  does  not  remind  us  that  Jesus  was  the  Word, 
and  that  "  the  word  "  became  a  technical  term  for 
the  Gospel.     Like  his   Master,  ,he  .emphasises  .the 

219 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

side  of  truth  that  most  needs  to  be  emphasised. 
Black  as  is  the  picture  he  draws,  he  does  not  exag- 
gerate the  power  of  the  tongue  to  corrupt  innocence, 
to  blast  reputations,  to  breed  suspicion  and  mistrust, 
to  destroy  souls.  His  point  is  that  much  of  the 
pettiness  and  foulness  of  human  nature  would  at 
least  end  with  themselves  if  only  we  could  prevent 
their  expression  in  speech. 


"  A  good  life,  especially  a  humble  life,  is  the 
hall-mark  of  ripe  wisdom  "  (almost  equal  to  "piety"). 
"  Fanatical  zeal,  selfish  ambition,  and  arrogance 
are  a  sure  sign  that  one  has  not  got  the  truth. 
Religion  of  this  kind  is  of  the  earth,  not  of  heaven  ; 
of  man's  lower  nature,  not  from  his  spiritual  nature  ; 
from  demons,  not  from  God  "  (iii.  13—15). 

44  True  pacifism  deals  not  with  war  and  strife, 
but  with  the  passions  that  lead  to  war  and  strife  : 
the  greed  that  will  not  hesitate  at  murder  if  it  is 
not  satisfied,  the  ambition  that  will  fling  nations 
at  each  other's  throats  rather  than  fail  of  its  aim. 
Some  men  even  pray  for  the  means  to  have  their 
sensual  impulses  satisfied,  and  are  surprised  when 
their  prayers  are  not  answered"  (iii.  16— iv.  3). 

"  Beware  of  the  desire  for  popularity.  The 
world's  friend  is   God's  enemy.     For  a  Christian 

229 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

to  be  at  home  in  the  world  is  spiritual  adultery  " 
(iv.  4-6). 

In  "  James  "  the  great  choice,  the  either-or,  is 
as  clear-cut  as  it  is  in  the  teaching  of  Jesus.  In 
his  way  of  expressing  it  he  is  more  in  line  with 
a  certain  development  of  Judaism  than  with  the 
general  trend  of  Jesus'  teaching.  To  Jesus  the 
material  world  is  God's  world  ;  it  abounds  in 
evidences  of  God's  love  and  care.  Even  the 
human  world  Jesus  neither  feared  nor  taught  His 
followers  to  fear.  He  sought  out  and  welcomed 
those  who,  judged  by  the  world's  standards,  were 
most  estranged  from  God  and  most  likely  to 
estrange  from  God  those  who  had  contact  with  them. 

Even  in  the  earlier  part  of  the  fourth  Gospel 
the  teaching  is  that  God  loves  the  human  world 
and  longs  for  its  salvation.  But  the  rejection 
and  crucifixion  of  Jesus,  the  part  played  in 
the  tragedy  by  Pharisee,  scribe  and  Sadducee, 
by  Jewish  political  power  in  the  person  of 
Herod  and  Roman  in  the  person  of  Pilate,  and 
the  later  persecutions  of  Christians  in  Palestine  and 
outside,  had  changed  all  this.  It  seemed  as  if  all 
the  world  were  arrayed  against  God's  Son  and  His 
followers.  In  the  later  chapters  of  John's  Gospel, 
as  earlier  in  Paul's  writings  and  also  in  "  James," 
"  the  world  "  becomes  the  very  embodiment  of  all 
in  life  that  is  opposed  to  God  and  to  Jesus.  On 
the  more  optimistic  view  of  the  future  of  Chris- 
tianity, progress  will  be  measured  by  the  extent  to 

221 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

which    the    opposition    between    God    and    "  the 
world  "  loses  its  sharpness. 


"  Resist  the  devil  and  he  will  flee  from  you. 
Draw  near  to  God  and  He  will  draw  near  to  you." 
Is  not  this,  with  all  its  virility,  less  gracious  than 
the  picture  of  the  shepherd  who  goes  out  after  his 
sheep  and  seeks  it  till  he  finds  it  ?  (iv.  7,  8). 

"  Loss  and  persecution  suffered  for  conscience' 
sake,  a  becoming  sense  of  our  own  shortcomings, 
a  heart  that  sympathises  with  the  sorrows  and 
failures  of  others,  are  more  becoming  than  the 
laughter  of  revelry,  ill-gotten  gains  and  ungodly 
triumph  "  (iv.  9).  We  seem  to  have  here  a  remin- 
iscence of  the  first  three  beatitudes,  as  the  following 
verse,  "  Humble  yourselves  before  God  and  He  will 
exalt  you,"  seems  to  be  an  echo  of  the  familiar 
saying  of  Jesus  in  Luke  xiv.  11. 

"  Our  criticisms  are  only  uninstructed  and  often 
ill-natured  opinions,  coming  from  men  who  them- 
selves continually  break  the  law  and  counting  for 
nothing.  The  issues  of  life  and  death  are  in  the 
hands  of  God  Who  gave  the  law."  The  critic 
often  reveals  more  of  himself  than  of  the  person 
(or  thing)  he  criticises.  Further,  when  we  are  guilty 
of  unkindly  criticism  of  our  brother,  we  assume  in 
the  first  place  that  we  know  enough  about  our 
brother's  circumstances  to  entitle  us  to  judge  him, 

222 


The  Tongue  and  Other  Perils 

which  we  usually  do  not.     We  assume  also  that 
we  are  the  repository  of  the  moral  standards  which 
decide  his  fate  ;    that  is  to  say,  we  put  ourselves 
in   the  place  of  God  as   represented  by  His  law. 
Our  age  claims  the  right  to  examine  the  validity 
of  moral  laws  however  venerable,   and  social  insti- 
tutions  however  hoary   with  age.     Yet  in  all   our 
study  of  them  we  must  give  due  weight  to  the 
accumulated  experience  of  ages  which,  under  divine 
guidance,  has  given  us  our  codes  and  institutions. 
Superficial  and  light-hearted  criticism,  which  ignores 
the  facts  and  refuses  to  study  history,  can  lead  only 
to  anarchy.     Moreover,  this  warning  against  judging 
one's  neighbour  is  meant  to  protect  from  injustice, 
not  to  embolden  to  vice.     Every  life  is  subject  to 
a  criticism  far  more  effective  than  any  "  brother  " 
can  ^  give— often   a  tragic  criticism,    the  judgment 
of  life  itself,  the  judgment  of  God,  as  James  calls 
it  (iv.  n,  12). 

This  paragraph  presumably  has  in  view  the 
controversies  of  a  period  in  which  ancient  standards 
are  being  found  insufficient  to  meet  the  needs  of 
a  new  age  that  probes  deeper  and  has  a  wider 
outlook.  It  is  a  useful  warning  against  the  excesses 
that  are  apt  to  characterise  such  an  epoch,  but 
underestimates  the  power  of  an  enlightened  public 
opinion  to  raise  the  moral  level  of  a  whole  people. 

"  In   making  your  plans  for  the  future  do  not 
arrogantly  forget,"  as  the  rich  fool  forgot,   "  that 

223 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

life  ends  in  death  and  that  we  are  all  in  the  hands 
of  God"  (iv.  13,  1 6). 

To  characterise  as  "  arrogance  "  the  making  of 
plans  for  the  future  without  an  explicit  "  if  the 
Lord  will "  (the  equivalent  of  the  Mahommedan 
inshallah)  strikes  the  modern  reader  as  more 
heathen  than  Christian.  That  the  formation  of 
every  project  for  the  future  should  be  made  the 
occasion  of  a  memento  mori  suggests  a  morbid 
outlook  on  life  which  we  do  not  associate  with 
Jesus.  Yet  everyone  who  has  seen  ambitious 
schemes,  especially  schemes  for  self-aggrandise- 
ment, frustrated  by  the  hand  of  death,  knows  that 
the  humility  which  James  inculcates  is  true  wisdom, 
the  remembrance  in  all  our  shaping  of  our  lives 
what  a  small  part  of  the  plan  we  see. 


"  Shortlived  is  the  happiness  of  you  men  whose 
one  aim  is  to  get  rich,  and  whose  path  to  wealth 
is  through  the  agony  and  tears  of  those  who  work 
for  you.  The  rust  of  your  unused  possessions  will 
be  a  witness  against  you.  God  has  heard  the  cry 
of  the  workmen  whose  wages  you  have  kept  back. 
Your  fatness  is  that  of  cattle  whose  day  of  slaughter 
has  come  "  (v.    I— 6). 

In  the  economic  system  of  the  age,  capital  played 
a  relatively  small  part  in  production  ;  so  that 
accumulations  of  wealth  rendered  their  owner 
liable  to  the  charge  of  selfishness.     The  principal 

224 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

forms  of  private  wealth  were  stores  of  foodstuffs, 
expensive  garments,  and  the  precious  metals.  The 
chief  weapon  the  powerful  man  had  for  becoming 
rich  at  the  expense  of  the  poor  was  the  withholding 
of  the  wages  of  his  workmen. 

That  the  perishableness  of  wealth  should  have 
so  deeply  impressed  the  moralists  of  the  time  was 
only  natural.  It  was  reserved  for  later  ages  to 
discover  means  by  which  wealthy  men  can  keep 
their  possessions  in  a  form  which  almost  defies  the 
possibility  of  loss.  To  that  extent  some  of  the 
social  teaching  of  the  New  Testament  requires  to 
be  rewritten.  James's  main  point  remains  un- 
shakeable.  God  is  against  all  unbrotherliness  in 
the  way  in  which  men  make  or  use  their  money, 
is  against  those  who  in  the  struggle  for  fortune  use 
their  fellow-men  as  pawns  in  the  game.  James 
acknowledges,  as  we  all  have  to  acknowledge,  that 
for  a  time  a  rich  man  can  press  on  to  the  satisfaction 
of  his  own  ambitions,  ignoring  the  claims  of  his 
fellow-workers  and  his  fellow-citizens,  forgetting 
that  they  are  human  beings  like  himself,  who  can 
think  and  feel  and  hope,  who  can  suffer  and  enjoy. 
The  rich  man  can  do  this.  James  has  the  faith 
which  he  inherits  from  Jewish  prophets  as  well  as 
from  Jesus,  that  he  cannot  do  it  with  impunity. 
God  hears  the  anguished  cry  of  the  oppressed  as 
He  heard  the  cry  of  the  blood  of  the  murdered 
Abel.  In  a  vivid  image  he  pictures  the  rust  of 
a  man's  superfluous  and  idle  gold  and  silver  cor- 

225  p 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

rupting  and  consuming  his  flesh.  (In  a  note, 
apparently  intended  to  be  taken  seriously,  Windisch 
suggests  that  the  author,  belonging  to  the  lower 
classes,  was  not  aware  that  the  precious  metals, 
speaking  generally,  are  not  susceptible  to  rust  !) 

James  is  pleading  here  in  the  first  place  for 
elementary  justice,  for  the  payment  of  wages  which 
have  been  earned.  There  is  also  a  suggestion  of 
the  deeper  feeling  that  merely  to  possess  super- 
fluous wealth  in  a  world  where  others  have  not  the 
bare  necessaries  of  life  is  to  sow  the  seeds  of  one's 
own  destruction.  The  passage  parallels  some  of 
the  fine  humanitarian  passages  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment prophets.  It  is  well  that  it  found  a  place 
in  the  New  Testament,  whose  prophets,  preoccupied 
with  the  things  of  the  spirit  and  believing  that  the 
coming  of  the  Lord  was  at  hand  (see  even  here  v.  5), 
were  inclined  to  undervalue  the  importance  of  ques- 
tions of  social  justice. 


"  Be  patient  in  your  troubles  and  do  not  blame 
each  other "  (the  special  temptation  of  harassed 
men).  "  The  Old  Testament  is  largely  a  record 
of  hardship  and  persecution  bravely  endured.  God's 
great  pity  may  be  hidden  for  a  time  ;  in  the  end 
it  shines  clear.  Besides,  your  troubles  are  nearly 
over  ;    the  Lord  is  at  hand  "  (v.   7-1 1). 

We  cannot  now  console  ourselves  with  this  last 
reflection  ;    but     the    record     of    nineteen    more 

226 


The  Tongue  and   Other  Perils 

centuries  of  suffering  endured  with  patience  and 
fortitude  "  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  " — suffering 
crowned  with  the  "  great  pity  and  mercy  "  of  the 
Lord — has  more  than  taken  its  place. 


"  The  man  who  always  speaks  the  truth  has  no 
need  to  use  strong  language  "  (v.    12). 

M  Let  your  feelings  find  their  natural  expression — 
prayer  in  a  time  of  trouble,  songs  of  praise  when 
things  are  going  well.  In  a  case  of  illness  send 
for  the  Church  leaders.  Mutual  confession,  united 
prayer,  and  simple  remedies  will  bring  forgiveness 
and  recovery.  A  good  man's  prayer  has  great 
influence,  as  we  learn  from  the  story  of  Elijah  " 
(v.  13—18).  This  section  reminds  us  that  the 
passage  iii.  iff.  is  not  the  whole  truth  about  the 
tongue.  The  simple  faith  and  piety  that  inspire 
the  advice  witness  to  the  futility  of  basing  on 
these  words  guidance  as  to  the  function  of  modern 
Church  officials,  recondite  theories  of  prayer,  or 
mystical  teaching  on  the  efficacy  of  oil,  medicinal 
or  sacramental. 


"  He  who  rescues  a  brother  that  has  gone  astray 
has  done  for  him  a  service  beyond  all  computing. 
It  is  not  only  that  his  sins  are  forgiven,  but  his  soul 
is  saved  from  Death  "  (v.   19,  20).      The  under- 

227 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

lying  idea  is  that  of  the  concluding  section  of  the 
parable  of  the  prodigal,  where  the  return  of  the 
younger  brother,  forlorn  figure  that  he  was,  became 
an  occasion  of  boundless  rejoicing,  because  it  made 
all  the  difference  between  life  and  death.  The 
question  has  been  discussed  whether  James  means 
that  the  soul  that  is  "  saved  "  is  that  of  the  wanderer 
or  of  the  man  who  brings  him  back.  Later  litera- 
ture seems  to  suggest  that  success  in  "  converting  " 
a  sinner  was  regarded  as  one  way  of  saving  one's 
own  soul,  but  that  is  not  a  New  Testament  idea. 


228 


THE  FIRST   EPISTLE  OF   PETER 

CHAPTER   XVIII 
AN   APOSTLE   OF   HOPE 

The  First  Epistle  of  Peter  is  one  of  the  so-called 
Catholic  Epistles,  and  it  has  some  claim  to  the 
description,  though  it  is  definitely  addressed  to 
Christians  in  Asia  Minor.  The  letter  purports  to 
be  written  by  "  Peter,  an  apostle  of  Jesus  Christ." 
This  is  usually  understood  to  refer  to  the  Peter 
of  the  Gospel  tradition  ;  and  while  there  are 
certain  difficulties  in  the  way  of  this  theory  of 
authorship,  no  convincing  evidence  seems  to  have 
been  brought  forward  by  those  who  reject  it. 

We  are  reminded  that  in  the  beginning  of  our 
era  and  for  long  afterwards  it  was  customary  to 
try  to  win  for  a  new  publication  a  spurious  influence 
by  attaching  to  it  the  name  of  some  leader  of  the 
past.  It  may  be  true  that  this  practice  was  recog- 
nised as  permissible  in  the  literary  moral  code  of 
the  day,  yet  it  is  obvious  that  these  false  ascrip- 
tions of  authorship  could  have  value  only  so  long 
as  the  reading  public  could  be  induced  to  accept 
them.  While  "  forgery,"  with  its  modern  associa- 
tions, may  be  too   strong   a   word   to   apply,   it  is 

229 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

difficult    to    think    that   with    men    of   scrupulous 
honour  the  practice  was  held  quite  unexceptionable. 

There  is  the  question  of  motive  also.  Apart 
from  the  opening  phrase  there  is  practically  nothing 
in  the  epistle  to  connect  it  with  Peter.  An  author 
trying  to  shelter  under  the  aegis  of  Peter  would 
surely  have  given  us  either  personal  reminiscences 
of  Jesus  or  suggestions  of  the  life  or  characteristics 
of  Peter  himself  that  would  have  assisted  in  the 
identification.  It  is  true  the  writer  claims  to  be 
a  "  witness  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ "  (v.  i). 
The  most  natural  meaning  of  this  sentence  would 
be  that  he  had  been  an  eye-witness  of  the  closing 
scenes  in  the  life  of  Jesus  ;  but  the  interpretation 
is  not  beyond  doubt.  The  word  "  martys  "  does 
not  necessarily  mean  "  eye-witness."  In  Acts 
xxii.  20  Stephen  is  called  a  "  martys  "  of  Jesus, 
and  in  Rev.  i.  5  Jesus  is  Himself  called  "  the 
faithful  martys."  In  any  case,  so  far  as  our  know- 
ledge of  Jesus  or  of  Peter  is  concerned,  there  is 
nothing  in  the  epistle  that  could  not  have  been 
written  by  any  great  Christian  teacher  with  the 
necessary  spiritual  insight  and  power. 

It  may  be  urged  that  that  very  fact  is  incon- 
sistent with  Petrine  authorship  ;  but  the  absence 
of  explicit  reference  to  the  life  and  ministry  of 
Jesus  in  this  letter  is  a  fact  of  the  same  kind  as, 
even  if  more  surprising  in  degree  than,  the  com- 
parative absence  of  such  references  in  the  letters 
of  Paul,   to   whom   many  of  the  facts   must  have 

3JO 


An  Apostle  of  Hope 

been  well  known,  and  indeed  in  the  New  Testament 
as  a  whole  outside  of  the  Gospels.     However  that 
may  be,  it  is  not  quite  easy  to  see  why  an  author, 
after  the  death  of  Peter,  wishing  to  pose  as  Peter, 
did  not  try  to  give  more  verisimilitude  to  his  claim  ; 
nor  indeed  why  one  who  had  no  new  truth  of  any 
kind  to  proclaim  should  have  tried  to  add  weight  to 
his  communication  by  arrogating  to  himself  the  name 
of  Peter.     The  epistle  is  a  word  of  encouragement 
to  disheartened  men,  sent  by  a  teacher  who  had 
penetrated  deeply  into  the  meaning  and  power  of 
the  Gospel — a  message  whose  "  validity  "  depended 
on  the  character  and  insight  of  the  author,  not  on 
his  name.     If  the  author  was  not  Peter,  there  is  no 
obvious  reason  why  he  should  have  claimed  to  be. 
If  the  author  calls  himself  Peter,  and  there  is  no 
apparent  motive  for  a  later  writer  trying  to  conceal 
his  identity  by  using  Peter's  name,  why  have  some 
hesitated  to  accept  the  letter  as  a  genuine  composi- 
tion of  Peter  ?     For  one  thing,  the  Greek  style  is 
much  better  than  we  should  have  expected  Peter 
to  have  at  command  ;    though  we  have  to  confess 
that  our  knowledge  of  the  quality  of  Peter's  written 
Greek  (assuming  that  he  could  write  Greek)  is  only 
guesswork.     This   difficulty  however   is  largely  or 
wholly  removed  by  the  intimation  (v.  12)  that  the 
"  brief  letter  "  is  being  written  "  through  Silvanus  " 
(presumably  the  Silas  or  Silvanus  of  Acts  and  the 
Pauline  epistles).     We  do  not  know  how  much  is 
covered  by  this   phrase  "  through   Silvanus  "  ;    it 

231 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

may  well  mean  much  more  than  that  Silvanus  was 
the  bearer  of  the  letter  or  even  the  writer's 
amanuensis.  If  Silvanus,  the  friend  and  com- 
panion of  Paul,  was  in  some  sense  joint  author  of 
the  epistle  and  responsible  for  its  form,  this  would 
help  to  explain  the  flavour  of  Paulinism  in  the 
letter.  Such  a  division  of  the  responsibility  of 
authorship  between  the  matter  and  the  form  is  not 
unknown  in  our  own  day. 

Difficulty  has  also  been  found  in  discovering  a 
period  during  the  lifetime  of  Peter  in  which  the 
Churches  of  Asia  Minor,  and  indeed  of  the  world, 
were  subject  to  such  persecution  as  is  implied  in 
this  letter.  According  to  a  tradition  which  goes 
back  at  least  to  Tertullian,  and  possibly  receives 
some  support  from  Clement  of  Rome  ("  ad  Corin- 
thios  "  v.  2—4),  writing  before  the  end  of  the  first 
century,  Peter  was  crucified  under  Nero,  presumably 
in  the  year  64.  The  claim  is  made  that  Nero's 
persecution  of  the  Christians  in  64  was  the  first 
outbreak  that  could  correspond  to  the  treatment 
of  the  Christians  described  in  this  epistle,  and  the 
inference  is  then  drawn  that  Peter  could  not  be 
the  author.  This  however  is  a  very  large  inference. 
The  letter  says  nothing  of  Christians  having  suffered 
martyrdom  ;  and  with  the  book  of  Acts  before  us 
and  the  persecution  passages  of  Paul's  epistles,  to 
say  nothing  of  our  knowledge  of  the  enmity 
aroused  in  many  parts  of  the  world  to-day  by  the 
mere  profession  of  Christianity,  it  seems  unsafe  to 

33a 


An  Apostle  of  Hope 

fix  any  year  as  the  earliest  date  at  which  the  perse- 
cutions of  the  epistle  might  have  occurred. 

The  absence  of  any  reference  to  the  controversy 
over  the  position  of  the  Law  in  the  Gentile  Churches 
might  possibly  imply  that  this  dispute  had  long 
since  been  settled.  The  letter  however  is  a  brief 
word  of  exhortation,  not  an  encyclopaedia  of  infor- 
mation on  the  religious  situation  of  the  time.  In 
all  such  inquiries  the  fact  must  never  be  over- 
looked that  the  author  was  not  writing  primarily 
to  illuminate  the  position  for  students  of  Intro- 
duction many  centuries  later.  On  the  whole  it  is 
open  to  us  to  believe  that  Peter  was  the  inspirer 
if  not  the  actual  author  of  the  letter. 

"  Hebrews,"  "  James  "  and  "  I  Peter  "  have  all 
this  in  common,  that  they  were  written  by  Christian 
teachers,  the  first  and  third  at  least  by  men  of 
unusual  spiritual  discernment  ;  possibly  also  that 
they  were  written  in  the  same  generation.  They 
have  however  other  links  of  connection.  There 
are  various  phrases  and  ideas  in  I  Peter  which 
suggest  that  it  emanated  from  the  same  religious 
atmosphere,  not  necessarily  from  the  same  geo- 
graphical area,  as  "  Hebrews."  The  object  of  the 
sufferings  of  the  Christ  was  "  that  He  might  bring 
you  to  God"  (iii.  1 8),  which  reminds  us  of  the 
refrain  of  "  Hebrews  "  :  "  Let  us  draw  near  to 
God."  Jesus  is  at  the  right  hand  of  God,  and  the 
angels  are  subject  to  Him  in  I  Peter  (iii.  22)  as 
in  "  Hebrews."     Jesus  is  "  the  shepherd  ...  of 

233 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

your  souls  "  (ii.  23)  and  "  the  chief  shepherd  "  (v.  4), 
as  in  the  prayer  at  the  end  of  "  Hebrews  "  He  is 
"  the  great  shepherd  of  the  sheep  "  (xiii.  20). 

The  almost  complete  absence  of  reference  to 
Church  officials  and  Church  organisation  is  com- 
mon to  the  two  epistles  ;  though  Peter  speaks  of 
presbyters,  and  is  himself  a  presbyter  (v.  1),  and 
he  almost  goes  out  of  his  way  to  refer  to  baptism 
(iii.  2  if.).  His  treatment  of  baptism  is  an  excellent 
illustration  of  the  "  impressionist "  method  of 
Scriptural  study  of  the  time.  He  finds  in  Noah's 
flood  a  type  of  baptism,  because  in  the  ark  Noah 
and  his  little  company  were  saved  "  through  water  " 
(that  is,  presumably,  "  by  passing  through  the 
water  ")  ;  which  seems  a  straining  of  the  figure, 
since  they  were  really  saved  from  the  water.  When 
he  comes  to  apply  the  idea  to  the  "  antitype,"  as  he 
calls  baptism,  it  is  to  the  cleansing,  not  the  saving 
power  of  water  he  looks  ;  and  the  spiritual  efficacy 
of  baptism  he  actually  finds  in  the  prayer  for  a 
good  conscience  that  accompanies  it. 

Just  before  this  (iii.  1 9)  occurs  the  much  disputed 
passage  about  the  spirits  in  prison.  As  is  now 
well  known,  Rendel  Harris  has  suggested  that 
after  the  Greek  words  "  enokai  "  at  the  beginning 
of  the  verse,  the  word  "  Enoch  "  has  dropped  out  ; 
a  type  of  accident  which  frequently  happened  in 
copying  manuscripts,  where  the  same  or  similar 
letters  were  repeated.  The  reference  would  then 
be  to  the  story  of  Enoch's  preaching  to  the  fallen 

334 


An  Apostle  of  Hope 

angels,  as  a  punishment  for  whose  sins  the  flood 
was  sent.  The  story  is  told  in  the  book  of  Enoch 
to  which  reference  is  also  made  in  the  epistle  of 
Jude. 

This  brilliant  emendation  has  been  accepted  by 
Moffatt,  Goodspeed  and  Martin  ;  it  has  however 
been  rejected  by  Peake,  Kennedy  and  Windisch. 
The  suggestion  has  in  fact  proved  to  be  almost  as 
tantalising  as  it  is  attractive.  We  know  that  there 
was  this  story  of  Enoch  preaching  to  the  imprisoned 
spirits  ;  we  do  not  know  that  there  was  at  this 
time  any  such  story  about  Jesus.  The  spirits 
moreover  to  whom  the  author  refers  were  precisely 
those  to  whom  Noah  preached.  That  pre-Christian 
preaching  might  be  called  "  evangelising  "  we  learn 
from  "  Hebrews  "  (iv.  2),  where  the  same  Greek 
word  is  used  as  is  used  in  1  Peter  iv.  6.  We  may 
grant  that  the  reference  to  Enoch  is  introduced 
somewhat  unexpectedly  ;  also  that  from  a  very 
early  time  the  Christian  imagination  must  have 
been  exercised  over  the  question  :  Where  was  the 
spirit  of  Jesus  between  His  death  and  His  resur- 
rection ? 

The  men  of  the  flood  generation  typified  the 
Kingdom  of  Satan  that  stood  over  against  the 
kingdom  of  God,  and  the  judgment  that  they  met 
formed  the  strongest  possible  contrast  to  the 
redeeming  love  of  God  as  exhibited  in  the  death 
and  resurrection  of  Jesus.  The  story  of  Jesus 
preaching   to   the   spirits   in    prison    was   a   natural 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

answer  to  questions  that  would  arise.1  Still  we 
do  not  know  that  at  the  time  this  epistle  was  written 
the  suggestion  had  taken  shape  ;  and  on  the  whole 
the  attractions  of  the  emendation  seem  greatly  to 
outweigh  the  difficulties  it  involves. 

Again,  the  parallels  between  i  Peter  and  James 
seem  too  frequent  and  too  close  to  be  the  result 
of  accident.  The  exhortation  to  rejoice  when 
exposed  to  trials,  which  is  common  to  both  (James  i. 
2,  3  ;  i  Peter  i.  6,  7),  might  be  in  both  cases  a 
reminiscence  of  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  ;  and 
the  phrase  used  by  both  in  the  same  connection 
— "  what  is  genuine  in  your  faith  " — may  be  due 
to  the  influence  of  Old  Testament  passages  :  the 
collocation  is  at  least  striking.  In  "  James " 
Christians  are  begotten  of  God  by  the  word  of 
truth  (i.  18)  ;  in  "  1  Peter"  they  are  born  again 
of  incorruptible  seed  through  the  word  of  God 
(i.  23).  Both  quote  the  verse  of  Proverbs  :  God 
resists  the  haughty  and  gives  grace  to  the  humble 
(James  iv.  6  ;  1  Peter  v.  5).  In  both  men  are 
called  on  to  submit  to  God  and  to  resist  the  devil 
(James  iv.  7  ;  1  Peter  v.  6,  9).  Both  quote  the 
same  phrase  of  Proverbs  about  covering  a  multi- 
tude of  sins  (James  v.  20  ;  1  Peter  iv.  8).  Appar- 
ently one  writer  borrowed  from  ,the  other  or  both 
were  indebted  to  a  common  source.2 

There  is  however  the  vital  distinction  between 
these  two  epistles,  that  whereas  it  is  at  least  arguable 

1  See  Windiich  ad  lot.  «  See  Biggs,  Introduction. 

236 


An   Apostle   of  Hope 

that  "  James,"  as  it  left  its  author's  hands,  was  not 
a  Christian  epistle  at  all,  "  I  Peter  "  is  Christian 
through  and  through.  From  the  very  first  sentence 
the  writer  will  not  let  his  readers  forget  that  he  is 
a  Christian  teacher  writing  to  Christians,  to  men 
who  in  the  eternal  purpose  of  God  have  been 
chosen  not  only  to  obey  Jesus  Christ  but  also  to 
be  sprinkled  with  His  blood  ;  a  metaphor  which, 
however  distasteful  it  may  be  to  the  susceptibilities 
of  our  age,  evidently  exercised  a  strange  power  in 
that  age,  over  men  who  were  as  near  God  as  we 
are,  and  had  as  much  insight  into  His  will. 

In  the  tradition  followed  by  "  Matthew  "  Jesus 
had  said  to  Peter  :  "  Thou  art  Peter  (the  rock 
man),  and  on  this  rock  I  will  build  my  Church." 
When  Paul  would  picture  the  Church  as  God's 
temple,  he  felt  that  Jesus  Himself  was  the  rock, 
the  foundation  beside  which  there  could  be  no 
other  (i  Cor.  iii.  1 1).  In  I  Peter  too,  Jesus  is 
the  chief  stone,  the  corner  stone,  of  the  new  edifice, 
the  spiritual  house  of  God  (ii.  4fT.)-  ^n  tne 
"  Matthew  "  tradition  a  few  verses  later  Jesus  calls 
Peter  a  "  scandal,"  a  stumbling-block  (xvi.  23). 
In  1  Peter  it  is  Jesus  Himself  who  is  not  only 
the  rock  but  the  "  scandal,"  the  rock  over  which 
all  men  stumble  who  will  have  none  of  Him  (ii.  8). 
(We  gather  that  the  early  Christians  were  fond  of 
gathering  Old  Testament  passages  that  used  the 
"  rock  "  or  the  "  stone  "  metaphor,  and  of  applying 
them  to  Jesus.) 

237 


Through  Eternal  Spirit 

The  "  house "  or  "  temple  "  image  had  this 
advantage  over  the  "  field  "  metaphor  which  Paul 
discards  for  it  (in  i  Cor.  iii),  that  it  left  a  place  for 
Jesus  as  the  foundation.  It  had  the  disadvantage 
that  whereas  a  field  represents  life,  stone  is  cold 
and  "  dead."  So  Peter,  using  one  of  his  favourite 
words,  defies  the  grammarians'  rules  for  the  use 
of  metaphors,  and  calls  Jesus  the  "  living  stone  " 
(ii.  4),  with  whom  for  a  foundation  Christians  as 
"  living  stones  "  are  to  form  the  temple  of  God, 
of  which  the  edifice  on  Zion  was  but  a  shadowy 
type  (ii.  5). 

It  may  be  that  the  unity  of  the  letter  is  broken 
at  iv.  12.  The  previous  section  ends  with  a  bene- 
diction, as  if  it  were  the  conclusion  of  the  letter. 
What  follows  begins  with  an  exhortation  to  men 
perplexed  by  undeserved  suffering,  and  has  no 
reference  to  the  discussion  of  the  same  subject  in 
the  earlier  part  of  the  epistle. 


238 


CHAPTER   XIX 
THE    CHRISTIAN    REVOLUTION 

This  beautiful  epistle  comes  to  us  like  a  breath 
from  the  hills  of  God.  The  writer  "  to  the 
Hebrews  "  tells  us  of  another  and  a  better  world, 
the  world  of  unseen  realities  ;  this  author  seems  to 
lift  us  right  into  it.  As  we  read  the  glowing  words 
of  the  inspired  writer,  words  that  help  us  to  know 
something  of  what  inspiration  means,  they  seem  to 
throb  with  the  new  power  that  comes  of  a  new 
vision. 

Peter  believes,  with  so  many  other  of  the  New 
Testament  writers,  that  "  the  end  of  all  things  is 
at  hand  "  (iv.  7)  ;  consequently  the  daring  ideal 
11  the  world  for  Christ "  hardly  falls  within  the 
range  of  his  speculation.  All  the  more  striking  is 
his  thought  of  the  Christian  rising  clear  above  the 
life  that  seeks  to  entangle  him.  In  his  way  of 
looking  at  things,  Christians  are  aliens  here  (i.  1  ; 
ii.  1 1),  dwelling  for  a  time  in  a  world  that  is  not 
our  true  home  (i.  17)  ;  yet  the  Christian,  making 
this  pilgrimage  through  a  foreign  land,  is  living  in 
a  world  where  neither  men  nor  powers  of  evil  have 

239 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

power  to  hurt  him,  save  by  his  consent.  The  one 
thing  they  fear  is  sin  ;  their  one  dread,  not  that 
they  may  suffer  but  that  they  may  suffer  deservedly 
(iv.  15).  The  writer  of  this  letter  is  thrilling  with 
the  joy  of  a  new  discovery.  He  and  the  men  to 
whom  he  writes  did  not  yet  date  their  correspondence 
from  the  birth  of  Christ  ;  but  for  them,  even  more 
really  than  for  us,  the  coming  of  the  Christ  was  the 
beginning  a  new  creation.  "  The  old  has  passed  ; 
behold  !   the  New  has  come  "  (2  Cor.  v.  17). 

With  the  coming  of  Jesus,  life  has  been  lit  up 
with  a  new  meaning  ;  rather,  for  the  Gentiles  at 
least,  life  now  for  the  first  time  has  a  meaning. 
What  they  had  called  life  hitherto  was  an  empty 
round  of  traditional  custom  (i.  18).  It  was  "empty" 
only  in  so  far  as  permanent  worth  was  concerned  ; 
it  was  full  enough  of  other  things,  things  which 
in  the  true  New  Testament  style  the  author  calls 
by  their  proper  names  (i.  14  ;  ii.  1  ;  iv.  3).  Peter 
no  doubt  knew  the  people  to  whom  he  was  writing, 
and  was  not  maligning  their  pre-Christian  record. 
No  one  will  say  that  the  morals  of  heathenism  in 
Asia  Minor  in  the  first  Christian  century  are 
typical  of  the  morals  of  the  whole  non-Christian 
world  ;  yet  in  Christianity,  as  in  no  other  religion, 
the  "  holy  "  man  is  the  good  man,  and  Peter  is  as 
convinced  as  the  writer  "  to  the  Hebrews  "  that 
a  life  lived  apart  from  "  the  living  God  "  revealed 
in  Jesus  Christ  is  a  tale  without  a  meaning. 

Facile    conceptions    of   salvation    find    no    more 

240 


The  Christian  Revolution 

support  in  this  epistle  than  in  any  other  part  of 
the  New  Testament.  The  Christian  is  called  to 
a  strenuous  life  which,  apart  from  the  grace  of 
God,  would  be  as  far  beyond  his  conception  as 
beyond  his  achievement.  The  devil  who  went 
about  like  a  roaring  lion  looking  for  victims  (v.  8) 
was  a  devil  that  took  very  human  forms,  the  forms 
of  cruel  persecutors.  What  made  them  terrible 
was  not  their  power  to  inflict  pain  but  their  power 
to  make  Christians  turn  traitor.  Thus  Peter  urges 
his  readers  to  be  stout  in  the  faith,  to  practise  self- 
restraint,  constant  wakefulness  as  of  an  army  sentry 
at  a  key  post  (v.  8,  9). 

There  is  the  struggle  too,  against  the  enemy 
within.  The  habits  of  centuries  do  not  lose  their 
power  all  in  a  moment  at  the  preaching  of  the 
Gospel  ;  but  in  the  Christian,  whatever  the  cost, 
they  must  be  broken.  The  fulfilment  of  heathen 
ideals  was  not  so  reprehensible  in  the  old  days 
when  they  knew  no  better,  before  they  came  to 
know  God  in  Jesus  ;  they  have  now  to  turn  their 
backs  on  their  old  life  (iv.  3).  Their  non-Christian 
neighbours  will  be  unable  to  understand  why  the 
old  pleasures  no  longer  have  any  attraction  for 
them,  and  will  tell  them  in  vigorous  language  what 
they  think  of  them  (iv.  4).  They  are  now  priests, 
priests  of  a  religion  in  which  character  is  the  one 
qualification  for  priesthood — royal  priests  because 
He  whom  they  serve  is  a  king,  called  on  daily  to 
offer  to  God  the  sacrifice  of  a  blameless  life  (ii.  5,  9). 

241  Q 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

To  be  a  Christian  is  to  be  a  follower  of  Jesus  ; 
a  follower  most  of  all  in  this,  that  when  the  world 
did  its  spiteful  worst  against  Him,  He  met  it  with 
none  of  its  own  weapons.  He  let  the  world  do 
its  worst,  knowing  that  from  its  wounds  a  healing 
stream  would  flow  (ii.  2 iff.).  Men  whose  model 
is  One  whose  only  crime  is  that  His  innocence 
and  graciousness  are  a  perpetual  rebuke  to  all  that 
is  petty  and  foul,  whose  power  lies  in  His  uncom- 
plaining submission  to  the  violence  which  is  the 
world's  answer  to  a  godlike  life,  have  said  good-bye 
to  wickedness  ;  it  is  in  goodness  they  must  find 
their  life  (ii.  24). 

All  the  more  must  they  keep  their  garments 
clean,  because  they  are  surrounded  by  unsympathetic 
and  sceptical  neighbours  who  cannot  understand 
the  change  that  has  come  over  them,  and  who  are 
only  too  ready  to  think  the  worst  (ii.  15).  The 
world  is  never  very  tolerant  to  those  who  are  dis- 
satisfied with  the  prevalent  standards  and  try  to 
rise  above  them  ;  but  in  communities  such  as  Peter 
has  in  view,  where  even  religion  meant  Oriental 
idolatry  with  all  that  that  implies,  Christians  would 
be  peculiarly  liable  to  the  charge  of  being  unsociable, 
"  enemies  of  the  human  race  "  ;  and  the  charac- 
teristic features  alike  of  their  worship  and  their 
life,  unintelligible  as  they  would  often  be  to  their 
neighbours,  would  be  judged  with  little  regard  for 
charity. 

Peter  is  as  conscious  as  the  apostle  Paul  of  the 
242 


The  Christian  Revolution 

dangers  that  lie  in  Christian  "  freedom."  The 
Christian  is  delivered  from  bondage  to  custom  and 
tradition,  bondage  to  a  law  that  seeks  to  meet 
with  its  appropriate  prescription  the  varied  dilemmas 
of  our  moral  lives  ;  he  is  not  delivered  from  the 
eternal  laws  of  right  and  wrong.  The  yoke  of 
Jesus  is  light  because  we  bow  our  necks  voluntarily, 
and  because  it  is  the  yoke  of  Jesus  ;  it  is  a  yoke 
all  the  same.  We  are  delivered  from  Law  or  from 
laws  only  to  become  slaves  of  God  (ii.  1 6). 

Other  men  may  try  to  be  good  ;  the  Christian 
is  an  enthusiast  for  goodness  (iii.  13)  ;  it  is  his 
one  enthusiasm.  For  the  Christian  revolution  is 
different  fundamentally  from  the  movements  the 
world  knows  by  that  name  ;  it  is  a  revolution 
primarily  in  his  own  ambitions,  motives,  and 
conduct.  The  Baptist  had  come  and  said  :  "  The 
change  our  people  needs  is  not  in  its  government 
but  in  its  own  life."  Jesus  had  steadfastly  resisted 
all  temptations  to  be  drawn  into  the  political  move- 
ment against  Rome  ;  He  had  paid  the  penalty 
with  His  life.  Christianity  came  before  the  world 
in  the  first  place  as  a  religion  that  maintained  that 
the  transformations  the  world  most  needs  are  those 
which  we  ourselves  by  the  grace  of  God  can  effect. 
Its  kingdom  is  not  of  this  world. 

We  read  unmoved  the  words  in  which  Peter 
counsels  submission  to  every  human  authority 
(ii.  13).  We  need  not  suppose  the  advice  was 
easy  to  give  or  altogether  palatable  for  the  readers. 

243 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

Men  who  had  originality  enough  to  accept  the 
Gospel  of  Jesus  would  often  be  the  most  critical 
of  human  institutions  and  the  most  resentful 
against  official  authority,  at  least  against  its  unjust 
employment.  The  Gospel  tradition  hints  not 
obscurely  at  the  struggle  through  which  Jesus 
passed  to  His  decision  that  His  way  did  not  lie 
through  a  contest  with  the  Roman  power. 

Yet  however  much  the  natural  man  might  rebel 
against  foreign  usurpation,  official  tyranny,  and  all 
forms  of  bondage,  Peter  is  as  convinced  as  Paul 
that  the  Christian  revolution  differs  from  the 
world's  revolutions  as  much  in  its  methods  as  in 
its  aims  (Rom.  xiii.  iff.  ;  I  Cor.  vii.).  The 
Christian  is  to  be  a  loyal  and  peaceful  citizen 
(ii.  1 3f.).  Far  from  the  Christian  slave  seeking 
his  freedom,  he  is  to  bear  patiently  whatever  wrong 
and  insults  his  master  may  put  upon  him  (ii.  18-20). 
The  author  does  not  even  raise  the  question  which 
Paul  discusses,  whether  the  Christian  wife  of  a 
"  heathen  "  husband  may  leave  him.  It  is  her 
place  to  accept  whatever  treatment  her  husband 
may  mete  out  to  her  (iii.  1). 

In  spite  of  the  sharp  distinction  that  was  drawn, 
or  rather  which  drew  itself,  between  Christians  and 
11  outsiders,"  there  is  the  fine  thought  that  all  men 
are  worthy  of  respect  and  therefore  are  to  be 
respected  ;  for  the  "  brotherhood  "  the  Christian 
will  have  the  warmer  feeling  of  affection.  The 
emperor  too  is  to  be  respected,  for  he  too  is  a  man, 

344 


The   Christian    Revolution 

but  in  the  mind  of  the  Christian  he  must  not  usurp 
the  place  of  God  ;  only  God  is  to  be  reverenced 
(ii.    17). 

In  his  counsel  of  "  submission  "  Peter  was  no 
doubt  influenced,  as  Paul  was  when  he  gave  similar 
advice,  by  the  consideration  that  a  general  rebellion 
of  Christians  against  the  political  and  social  "status 
quo  "  would  divert  the  religion  of  Jesus  on  to  a 
wrong  track.  Like  Paul  also,  he  believed  the  end 
of  all  things  was  at  hand,  and  therefore  saw  all 
projects  of  "  reform  "  in  what  he  believed  to  be 
their  relative  insignificance.  But  it  seems  to  have 
been  neither  of  these  considerations  that  chiefly 
moved  Peter  to  the  advice  he  gave. 

Political  inoffensiveness  is  urged  "  for  the  sake 
of  the  Lord"  (ii.  13).  Servants  are  invited  to  a 
policy  of  patient  non-resistance  "  because  Christ 
also  suffered  for  you,  leaving  you  an  example  that 
you  might  follow  in  His  footsteps  "  (ii.  21).  If  the 
downtrodden  wife  is  not  to  fight  for  her  rights, 
the  reason  is  not  that  she  has  no  rights  but  that 
there  are  far  higher  interests  at  stake.  If  she  will 
meet  her  oppressor  as  her  Master  met  His 
oppressors,  her  life  will  be  an  unspoken  sermon 
that  may  "  win  "  her  husband  (iii.  if.  ;  1  Cor.  vii. 
16).  In  Christian  marriage,  the  husband  is  to 
treat  his  wife  with  intelligent  thoughtful  ness, 
rendering  her  the  chivalrous  honour  due  from  the 
stronger  to  the  weaker,  and  remembering  that  in 
the  kingdom  of  God  there  are  no  distinctions  of 

245 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

sex  ;   the  truth  which  so  large  a  section  of  the  non- 
Christian  world  has  so  strenuously  denied  (iii.  7). 

In  Peter's  treatment  of  the  whole  subject  there 
is  no  suggestion  of  that  anaemic  submissiveness 
which  has  sometimes  been  supposed  to  charac- 
terise the  Christian  ideal.  If  the  author  was  the 
Peter  we  know,  or  anyone  with  the  spirit  of  Peter, 
we  can  readily  conceive  that  he  did  not  reach  the 
position  he  takes  up  here  without  many  a  struggle 
with  the  Old  Adam.  He  has  come  to  see  that  the 
way  of  the  cross  is  the  way  of  victory  :  of  victory 
not  for  oneself — that  is  a  minor  consideration' — 
but  of  victory  for  God  ;  is  the  only  way  to  "  win  " 
to  the  new  way  of  life  those  who  would  struggle  to 
the  death  against  all  other  kinds  of  resistance  to 
the  wrongs  they  are  inflicting.  Christianity  is  no 
match  for  the  world  when  it  fights  with  the  world's 
weapons  ;  in  the  strength  of  the  cross  it  is 
irresistible. 

Peter  counsels  the  way  of  the  cross,  in  part 
because  the  new  life  that  Jesus  has  opened  up  to 
him  has  lifted  him  into  a  realm  where  all  our  petty 
questions  of"  rights  "  and  "  wrongs  "  are  irrelevant. 
The  Christian  citizen,  however  much  he  might  be 
oppressed  by  earthly  potentates,  might  possess  his 
soul  in  patience  ;  he  was  a  citizen  of  another 
kingdom  where  the  wrath  of  the  emperor  and  his 
satellites  could  not  touch  him  ;  not  only  a  citizen 
but  a  priest,  a  royal  priest.  The  Christian  slave 
could  forget  his  wrongs  and  insults  in  this  joy  that 

246 


The  Christian  Revolution 

he  was  Christ's  freedman  and  God's  slave  (ii.  16). 
The  meekness  of  the  Christian  wife  is  no  cowardice  ; 
if  she  is  a  true  daughter  of  Sarah  she  will  show 
fearless  courage  (iii.  6),  and  every  Christian  woman 
may  wear  that  most  graceful  of  all  attire,  the  quiet 
and  gentle  yet  brave  spirit  that  God  loves  (iii.  3ff.). 

The  writer  does  not  merely  touch  on  the  Christian 
attitude  to  undeserved  suffering  ;  it  is  central  in 
the  epistle.  Almost  as  much  as  the  epistle  "  to 
the  Hebrews,"  it  is  written  to  put  new  heart  into 
men  and  women  who  are  discouraged  by  the 
experiences  through  which  they  are  passing.  It 
would  not  be  quite  correct  to  say  that  in  the  drama 
of  "  Job  "  the  Old  Testament  reaches  its  highest 
degree  of  insight  into  the  perennial  question  of 
the  meaning  of  unmerited  suffering  ;  for  that  we 
have  to  turn  to  the  "  Servant "  passages  in 
"  Isaiah."  But  "  Job  "  is  at  least  the  most  elabor- 
ate and  challenging  study  of  the  problem  in  the 
Old  Testament. 

Yet  the  question  with  which  I  Peter  deals  is 
a  far  more  difficult  question  than  that  with  which 
Job  wrestled.  What  roused  Job  to  almost  blas- 
phemous criticism  of  God's  ways  with  men  was 
that  he  should  be  tormented  as  he  was  in  spite  of 
his  goodness  ;  the  New  Testament  problem  is 
why  men  should  be  tortured  as  they  are  because  of 
their  goodness.  The  book  of  "  Job  "  leaves  us 
wondering  whether  there  is  any  solution,  or  at 
least   whether  the   author   has   found   it.      I    Peter 

247 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

leaves  us  wondering  whether  there  is  any  problem, 
at  least  for  one  who  has  caught  anything  of  the 
spirit  of  Jesus.  The  New  Testament  is  largely 
a  story  of  suffering  for  righteousness'  sake,  for 
fidelity  to  God  and  truth  ;  yet  all  through  i  Peter, 
as  all  through  the  New  Testament,  runs  the  note 
of  victorious  confidence,  the  feeling  that  there  is 
nothing  to  explain,  except  to  "  babes "  who 
imperfectly  apprehend  the  meaning  of  the  faith 
(ii.  2). 

The  "  trials  "  that  the  readers  are  called  on  to 
face  are  only  an  insignificant  preliminary  to  the 
"  inheritance "  which  God  is  keeping  for  them 
and  for  which  God  is  keeping  them  (i.  4-6). 
These  trials  test  their  faith  ;  if  they  stand  the  test, 
they  will  one  day  hear  the  "  Well  done,  good  and 
faithful  servant  "  (i.  7).  There  is  nothing  to  be 
surprised  at  even  in  "  fiery  trials  "  ;  they  are  part 
of  a  normal  Christian  experience  (iv.  12).  One 
explanation  of  the  sufferings  of  Christians  is  that 
there  is  a  spirit  in  the  world  hostile  to  the  Christian 
and  all  that  he  stands  for  ;  the  follower  of  Jesus 
cannot  hope  to  escape  unscathed,  but  he  can  at 
least  learn  to  "  pay  the  same  tax  of  suffering  "  as 
his  Christian  brothers  are  paying  in  every  part  of 
the  world  (v.   8,  9). 

Above  all,  they  who  suffer  for  their  Christian 
profession  have  a  fellowship  in  the  sufferings  of 
the  Christ  (iv.  13).  The  glorious  spirit  of  God 
rests  on  them  (iv.  14).     The  Christ  had  suffered, 

248 


The   Christian  Revolution 

not  only  through  no  fault  of  His  own,  not  only  in 
spite  of  His  loyalty  to  God,  but  as  a  direct  conse- 
quence of  that  loyalty.  God  had  raised  Him  from 
the  dead  ;  He  lived  in  the  hearts  of  Christians. 
In  the  experience  of  Peter,  in  the  experience  of 
multitudes  of  followers  of  Jesus  like  himself  all 
over  the  world,  they  were  finding  the  solution  of 
the  problem  of  pain,  of  suffering  for  righteousness' 
sake.  By  Jesus'  stripes  they  were  being  healed. 
He  had  died,  the  just  for  the  unjust  ;  and  because 
the  Just  had  died,  the  "  unjust"  for  the  first. time 
knew  what  it  was  to  live  (ii.   21—25  ;    iii.    18). 

Like  the  writer  "  to  the  Hebrews  "  Peter  has 
no  theory  of  the  Atonement.  He  evidently  has 
in  mind  Isaiah  liii.  ;  he  uses  the  ransom  metaphor 
which  Paul  also  uses,  and  more  than  once  he 
employs  the  language  of  sacrifice  (i.  2,  19).  His 
theology,  undeveloped  as  it  is,  has  power,  because 
it  is  his  attempt  to  explain  the  strange  thing  that 
has  happened  to  him  and  to  multitudes  of  others. 
They  have  been  ushered  into  the  presence  of  a 
wondrous  blaze  of  light,  that  has  made  all  their 
past  life  seem  like  darkness  (ii.  9)  The  new  life 
which  is  theirs  has  made  all  their  past  career  seem 
like  death.  Men  who  had  nothing  to  look  forward 
to  have  been  inspired  with  hope  ;  hope  not  in  the 
world's  sense  but  in  the  Christian  sense,  the  assur- 
ance that  the  future  is  not  hidden  and  fearful,  but 
is  lit  with  God's  redeeming  love  (i.  3,21  ;  ii.  4,  5). 
"  The  hope  that  is  in  you  "  (iii.  15)  so  distinguishes 

249 


Through   Eternal   Spirit 

the  Christian,  is  so  unintelligible  to  his  neighbours, 
that  it  can  fitly  designate  the  new  faith. 

All  this  Peter  and  those  to  whom  he  writes 
know  that  they  owe  to  Jesus.  He  does  not  speak 
of  God's  love  to  men  or  man's  love  to  God  ;  but 
it  is  to  him  we  owe  the  striking  phrase  "  whom 
though  you  have  not  seen  Him  you  love  "  (i.  8)  ; 
a  way  of  speaking  of  Jesus  that  makes  us  chary 
of  accepting  theories  that  make  Him  a  spectral 
figure  that  fitted  into  the  "  salvation  "  schemes  of 
the  "  mystery "  religions.  The  Jesus  Christ  of 
Peter  and  his  friends  was  one  who  had  been  flesh 
and  blood,  who  was  clothed  with  attributes,  who 
could  call  forth  the  deepest  emotion.  Although 
they  did  not  see  Him  with  the  bodily  eye,  they 
trusted  Him  (i.  8). 

What  had  moved  them  chiefly  in  the  story  of 
Jesus  was  His  death,  not  only  the  fact  of  it  but 
the  manner  of  it.  He  who  had  helped  multitudes 
and  wronged  none  had  gone  to  His  death  uncom- 
plainingly, choosing  to  let  His  enemies  do  their 
worst  in  the  belief,  a  belief  that  the  history  of 
Christendom  has  abundantly  justified,  that  His 
death  would  move  men  and  remake  men  as  His 
life  had  not  done  (ii.  2 iff.).  In  the  crucifixion  of 
Jesus  we  have  in  its  acutest  form  the  problem  of 
unmerited  suffering  ;  and  His  followers  speedily 
learned  that  the  cross  of  Jesus  did  not  mean  that 
we  are  living  in  a  world  where  anything  may 
happen,   where  wickedness   may   run   amuck   with 

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The   Christian   Revolution 

impunity  and  the  evil   is   as  likely   to   prosper   as 
the  good. 

Jesus  had  appeared  in  the  flesh  but  a  generation 
or  two  before,  but  the  cross  of  Christ  represented 
the  mind  of  God  from  all  eternity  ;  the  answer  to 
all  our  questionings  was  found  when  God  raised 
Him  from  the  dead,  "  and  gave  Him  glory " 
(i.  20,  21).  Peter  never  asks  what  the  rising  from 
the  dead  meant.  He  knew  what  it  meant  to  him 
and  to  the  Christian  fellowship  :  that  through  the 
risen  Christ  they  had  been  raised  to  a  new  plane 
of  existence,  a  new  level  of  potentiality.  The 
epistle  throbs  with  gratitude  to  God  (i.  3ff.  ;  ii.  o,f.), 
and  to  Jesus  (i.  8f.  ;    ii.  25  ;    iii.  18). 

While  this  sense  of  being  new  men  living  in  a 
new  world  permeates  the  letter,  there  is  in  it  also 
a  deeper  feeling.  The  author  shares  with  the 
writer  "  to  the  Hebrews  "  the  power  of  realising 
the  unseen  realities,  of  piercing  through  the  shadow 
to  the  substance.  But  there  is  in  the  letter  too 
an  undertone  of  almost  trembling  expectancy,  the 
Christian  certainty  that  the  story  of  God's  dealings 
with  His  children  is  not  yet  fully  told,  that  what 
the  future  hides  from  us  is  but  a  fuller  proof  of 
God's  love.  In  the  words  of  a  quotation  of  Paul 
from  an  undiscovered  source  :  "  What  eye  has  not 
seen,  and  ear  has  not  heard,  and  has  not  entered 
into  the  heart  of  man,  all  that  God  has  made  ready 
for  those  that  love  Him  "  (1  Cor.  ii.  9).  Through 
the  new  life  that  is  in  them,  they  have  become  heirs 

251 


Through  Eternal   Spirit 

of  an  inheritance  that  cannot  know  destruction 
or  corruption  or  decay  (i.  4).  As  they  gradu- 
ally enter  into  that  deliverance  of  soul  that  is 
the  consummation  of  their  loyalty  to  Jesus,  well 
may  they  exult  with  joy  unutterable  and  exalted 
(i.   8,  9). 

One  of  the  author's  favourite  words  is  "  Revela- 
tion "  in  its  different  forms.  Jesus  Christ  has 
already  been  "  made  manifest "  (i.  20),  but  the 
world  has  as  yet  only  begun  to  know  Him.  As 
under  the  spell  of  His  cross  we  tear  from  our  eyes 
the  veil  of  selfishness  and  impurity  that  hides  Him 
from  us,  as  each  new  race  that  comes  to  worship 
Him  finds  in  Him  some  new  beauty,  gradually 
His  true  glory  will  be  revealed  and  all  flesh  shall 
see  it  together.  Twice  the  author  speaks  of  "  the 
apocalypse,  the  revelation  of  Jesus  Christ  "  (i.  7  ; 
i.  13),  once  of  the  "apocalypse  of  His  glory" 
(iv.  13).  One  day  we  shall  see  Him  as  He  is,  and 
all  who  have  been  faithful  to  their  trust  shall  enter 
into  the  joy  of  their  Lord  (i.  7  ;  iv.  13).  What 
He  has  done  for  us  He  has  done  "  in  the  spirit  of 
the  eternal."  The  life  that  is  in  us  is  the  life  that 
knows  no  corruption,  for  its  source  is  the  word  of 
God  that  abides  for  ever  (i.  23-25).  When  the 
chief  shepherd  is  seen  at  last  with  face  unveiled, 
His  faithful  pastors  will  receive  the  wreath  of  the 
victor's  glory  (v.  4).  The  wreath  that  adorns  the 
brow  of  the  winner  in  an  earthly  contest  is  made 
of  leaves  which,   as  they  fade,  typify  the  fleeting 

252 


The   Christian  Revolution 

nature  of  the  achievement  and  its  glory  ;   the  crown 
that  God  gives  is  a  crown  of  life. 

Some  of  these  things  we  would  to-day  express 
in  other  language  ;  but,  allowing  for  the  difference 
in  vocabulary  that  comes  from  lapse  of  time  and 
change  of  thought-forms,  the  faith  and  hope  of 
Peter  have  been  throughout  the  ages  and  are  to-day 
the  faith  and  hope  of  the  Church, 


*53 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

In  addition  to  Bible  Dictionaries  and  general  works  on  New 
Testament  Introduction  and  Theology,  the  following  may  be 
consulted  : — 

Wade.     New  Testament  History. 
Kennedy.     The  Theology  of  the  Epistles. 
McNeile.     New  Testament  Teaching  in  the  Light  of  St.  Paul'*. 
Harnack.     Expansion  of  Christianity. 

McGiffert.     History  of  Christianity  in  the  Apostolic  Age. 
Ramsay.     Church  in  the  Roman  Empire. 
Peake.     Commentary  on  the  Bible. 

ON  "  HEBREWS  " 

Scott.     Epistle  to  the  Hebrews. 

Nairne.     The  Epistle  of  Priesthood. 

Milligan.     The  Theology  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews. 

Bruce.     The  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews. 

Commentaries  by  :  MofFatt  (International  Critical  Commentary), 
Hollmann  (Weiss),  Dods  (Expositor's  Greek  Testament), 
Peake  (Century  Bible),  Davidson  (Handbooks  for  Bible 
Classes),  Wickham  (Westminster  Commentaries),  Windisch 
(Lietzmann),  Hastings  (Speaker's  Bible),  Maynard  Smith, 
Nairne  (Cambridge  Greek  Testament),  Edwards  (Expositor'* 
Bible). 

ON  "JAMES" 

Commentaries  by :  Mayor,  Dibelius  (Meyer),  Ropes  (I.C.C.), 
Oesterley  (E.G.T.),  Hollmann  (Weiss),  Windisch 
(Lietzmann),  Plummer(Exp.  Bib.),  Knowling  (West.  Com.). 

ON  "1   PETER" 

Commentaries  by :  Bigg  (I.C.C.),  Gunkel  (Weiss),  Windisch 
(Lietzmann),  Hart  (E.G.T.),  Bennett  (Cent.  Bib.),  Master- 
man,  Lumby  (Exp.  Bib.). 

255 


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